Xarge#aper  tuition 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA 
By  JOHN  FISKE 


VOLUME  I 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/discoveryofameri11fisk 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF 
AMERICA 


WITH  SOME  ACCOUNT  OF  ANCIENT  AMERICA 
AND  THE  SPANISH  CONQUEST 

By  JOHN  FISKE 

IN  TWO  VOLUMES 
VOLUME  FIRST 
PART  ONE 


CAMBRIDGE 

prmteu  at  tl )t  fttbersfae 


M DCCC  XCII 


Copyright,  1892 
By  JOHN  FISKE 

All  rights  reserved 


Ctoo  $unbreb  anb  Jfiftg  Copied  ^rinteb 


TO 

EDWARD  AUGUSTUS  FREEMAN, 

A SCHOLAR  WHO  INHERITS  THE  GIFT  OF  MIDAS,  AND 
TURNS  INTO  GOLD  WHATEVER  SUBJECT  HE 
TOUCHES,  I DEDICATE  THIS  BOOK,  WITH 
GRATITUDE  FOR  ALL  THAT  HE 
HAS  TAUGHT  ME 


PREFACE. 


The  present  work  is  the  outcome  of  two  lines  of 
study  pursued,  with  more  or  less  interruption  from 
other  studies,  for  about  thirty  years.  It  will  be 
observed  that  the  book  has  two  themes,  as  different 
in  character  as  the  themes  for  voice  and  piano  in 
Schubert’s  “ Friihlingsglaube,”  and  yet  so  closely 
related  that  the  one  is  needful  for  an  adequate 
comprehension  of  the  other.  In  order  to  view  in 
their  true  perspective  the  series  of  events  com- 
prised in  the  Discovery  of  America,  one  needs  to 
form  a mental  picture  of  that  strange  world  of 
savagery  and  barbarism  to  which  civilized  Euro- 
peans were  for  the  first  time  introduced  in  the 
course  of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries,  in 
their  voyages  along  the  African  coast,  into  the 
Indian  and  Pacific  oceans,  and  across  the  Atlantic. 
Nothing  that  Europeans  discovered  during  that 
stirring  period  was  so  remarkable  as  these  antique 
phases  of  human  society,  the  mere  existence  of 
which  had  scarcely  been  suspected,  and  the  real 
character  of  which  it  has  been  left  for  the  present 
generation  to  begin  to  understand.  Nowhere  was 


VI 


PREFACE. 


this  ancient  society  so  full  of  instructive  lessons  as 
in  aboriginal  America,  which  had  pursued  its  own 
course  of  development,  cut  off  and  isolated  from 
the  Old  World,  for  probably  more  than  fifty  thou- 
sand years.  The  imperishable  interest  of  those 
episodes  in  the  Discovery  of  America  known  as 
the  conquests  of  Mexico  and  Peru  consists  chiefly 
in  the  glimpses  they  afford  us  of  this  primitive 
world.  It  was  not  an  uninhabited  continent  that 
the  Spaniards  found,  and  in  order  to  comprehend 
the  course  of  events  it  is  necessary  to  know  some- 
thing about  those  social  features  that  formed  a large 
part  of  the  burden  of  the  letters  of  Columbus  and 
Yespucius,  and  excited  even  more  intense  and  gen- 
eral interest  in  Europe  than  the  purely  geograph- 
ical questions  suggested  by  the  voyages  of  those 
great  sailors.  The  descriptions  of  ancient  America, 
therefore,  which  form  a kind  of  background  to  the 
present  work,  need  no  apology. 

It  was  the  study  of  prehistoric  Europe  and  of 
early  Aryan  institutions  that  led  me  by  a natural 
sequence  to  the  study  of  aboriginal  America.  In 
1869,  after  sketching  the  plan  of  a book  on  our 
Aryan  forefathers,  I was  turned  aside  for  five  years 
by  writing  “ Cosmic  Philosophy.”  During  that  in- 
terval I also  wrote  “ Myths  and  Myth-Makers  ” as 
a side-work  to  the  projected  book  on  the  Aryans, 
and  as  soon  as  the  excursion  into  the  field  of  gen- 
eral philosophy  was  ended,  in  1874,  the  work  on 


PREFACE. 


vi  i 


that  book  was  resumed.  Fortunately  it  was  not 
then  carried  to  completion,  for  it  would  have  been 
sadly  antiquated  by  this  time.  The  revolution  in 
theory  concerning  the  Aryans  has  been  as  remark- 
able as  the  revolution  in  chemical  theory  which 
some  years  ago  introduced  the  New  Chemistry.  It 
is  becoming  eminently  probable  that  the  centre  of 
diffusion  of  Aryan  speech  was  much  nearer  to 
Lithuania  than  to  any  part  of  Central  Asia,  and 
it  has  for  some  time  been  quite  clear  that  the  state 
of  society  revealed  in  Homer  and  the  Yedas  is  not 
at  all  like  primitive  society,  but  very  far  from  it. 
By  1876  I had  become  convinced  that  there  was 
no  use  in  going  on  without  widening  the  field  of 
study.  The  conclusions  of  the  Aryan  school  needed 
to  be  supplemented,  and  often  seriously  modified,  by 
the  study  of  the  barbaric  world,  and  it  soon  became 
manifest  that  for  the  study  of  barbarism  there  is 
no  other  field  that  for  fruitfulness  can  be  compared 
with  aboriginal  America. 

This  is  because  the  progress  of  society  was  much 
slower  in  the  western  hemisphere  than  in  the  east- 
ern, and  in  the  days  of  Columbus  and  Cortes  it 
had  nowhere  “ caught  up  ” to  the  points  reached 
by  the  Egyptians  of  the  Old  Empire  or  by  the 
builders  of  Mycenae  and  Tiryns.  In  aboriginal 
America  we  therefore  find  states  of  society  pre- 
served in  stages  of  development  similar  to  those  of 
our  ancestral  societies  in  the  Old  World  long  ages 


Vlll 


PREFACE . 


before  Homer  and  the  Vedas.  Many  of  the  social 
phenomena  of  ancient  Europe  are  also  found  in 
aboriginal  America,  but  always  in  a more  primitive 
condition.  The  clan,  phratry,  and  tribe  among 
the  Iroquois  help  us  in  many  respects  to  get  back 
to  the  original  conceptions  of  the  gens,  curia,  and 
tribe  among  the  Romans.  We  can  better  under- 
stand the  growth  of  kingship  of  the  Agamemnon 
type  when  we  have  studied  the  less  developed  type 
in  Montezuma.  The  house-communities  of  the 
southern  Slavs  are  full  of  interest  for  the  student 
of  the  early  phases  of  social  evolution,  but  the 
Mandan  round-house  and  the  Zuni  pueblo  carry  us 
much  deeper  into  the  past.  Aboriginal  American 
institutions  thus  afford  one  of  the  richest  fields  in 
the  world  for  the  application  of  the  comparative 
method,  and  the  red  Indian,  viewed  in  this  light, 
becomes  one  of  the  most  interesting  of  men ; for 
in  studying  him  intelligently,  one  gets  down  into 
the  stone  age  of  human  thought.  No  time  should 
be  lost  in  gathering  whatever  can  be  learned  of 
his  ideas  and  institutions,  before  their  character 
has  been  wholly  lost  under  the  influence  of  white 
men.  Under  that  influence  many  Indians  have 
been  quite  transformed,  while  others  have  been  as 
yet  but  little  affected.  Some  extremely  ancient 
types  of  society,  still  preserved  on  this  continent 
in  something  like  purity,  are  among  the  most  in- 
structive monuments  of  the  past  that  can  now  be 


PREFACE. 


IX 


found  in  the  world.  Such  a type  is  that  of  the 
Moquis  of  northeastern  Arizona.  I have  heard  a 
rumour,  which  it  is  to  be  hoped  is  ill-founded,  that 
there  are  persons  who  wish  the  United  States 
government  to  interfere  with  this  peaceful  and 
self-respecting  people,  break  up  their  pueblo  life, 
scatter  them  in  farmsteads,  and  otherwise  compel 
them,  against  their  own  wishes,  to  change  their 
habits  and  customs.  If  such  a cruel  and  stupid 
thing  were  ever  to  be  done,  we  might  justly  be 
said  to  have  equalled  or  surpassed  the  folly  of 
those  Spaniards  who  used  to  make  bonfires  of 
Mexican  hieroglyphics.  It  is  hoped  that  the  pres- 
ent book,  in  which  of  course  it  is  impossible  to 
do  more  than  sketch  the  outlines  and  indicate  the 
bearings  of  so  vast  a subject,  will  serve  to  awaken 
readers  to  the  interest  and  importance  of  American 
archaeology  for  the  general  study  of  the  evolution 
of  human  society. 

So  much  for  the  first  and  subsidiary  theme.  As 
for  my  principal  theme,  the  Discovery  of  America, 
I was  first  drawn  to  it  through  its  close  relations 
with  a subject  which  for  some  time  chiefly  occu- 
pied my  mind,  the  history  of  the  contact  between 
the  Aryan  and  Semitic  worlds,  and  more  particu- 
larly between  Christians  and  Mussulmans  about 
the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean.  It  is  also  in- 
teresting as  part  of  the  history  of  science,  and 
furthermore  as  connected  with  the  beginnings  of 


X 


PREFACE. 


one  of  the  most  momentous  events  in  the  career  of 
mankind,  the  colonization  of  the  barbaric  world  by 
Europeans.  Moreover,  the  discovery  of  America 
has  its  full  share  of  the  romantic  fascination  that 
belongs  to  most  of  the  work  of  the  Kenaissance 
period.  I have  sought  to  exhibit  these  different 
aspects  of  the  subject. 

The  present  book  is  in  all  its  parts  written  from 
the  original  sources  of  information.  The  work  of 
modern  scholars  has  of  course  been  freely  used, 
but  never  without  full  acknowledgment  in  text  or 
notes,  and  seldom  without  independent  verification 
from  the  original  sources.  Acknowledgments  are 
chiefly  due  to  Humboldt,  Morgan,  Bandelier,  Major, 
Yarnhagen,  Markham,  Helps,  and  Harrisse.  To 
the  last-named  scholar  I owe  an  especial  debt  of 
gratitude,  in  common  with  all  who  have  studied 
this  subject  since  his  arduous  researches  were 
begun.  Some  of  the  most  valuable  parts  of  his 
work  have  consisted  in  the  discovery,  reproduction, 
and  collation  of  documents ; and  to  some  extent 
his  pages  are  practically  equivalent  to  the  original 
sources  inspected  by  him  in  the  course  of  years  of 
search  through  European  archives,  public  and  pri- 
vate. In  the  present  book  I must  have  expressed 
dissent  from  his  conclusions  at  least  as  often  as 
agreement  with  them,  but  whether  one  agrees 
with  him  or  not,  one  always  finds  him  helpful  and 
stimulating.  Though  he  has  in  some  sort  made 


PREFACE . 


xi 


himself  a Frenchman  in  the  course  of  his  labours, 
it  is  pleasant  to  recall  the  fact  that  M.  Harrisse 
is  by  birth  our  fellow-countryman  ; and  there  are 
surely  few  Americans  of  our  time  whom  stu- 
dents of  history  have  more  reason  for  holding  in 
honour. 

I have  not  seen  Mr.  Winsor’s  “Christopher 
Columbus  ” in  time  to  make  any  use  of  it.  Within 
the  last  few  days,  while  my  final  chapter  is  going 
to  press,  I have  received  the  sheets  of  it,  a few 
days  in  advance  of  publication.  I do  not  find  in 
it  any  references  to  sources  of  information  which 
I have  not  already  fully  considered,  so  that  our 
differences  of  opinion  on  sundry  points  may  serve 
to  show  what  diverse  conclusions  may  be  drawn 
from  the  same  data.  The  most  conspicuous  differ- 
ence is  that  which  concerns  the  personal  character 
of  Columbus.  Mr.  Winsor  writes  in  a spirit  of 
energetic  (not  to  say  violent)  reaction  against  the 
absurdities  of  Roselly  de  Lorgues  and  others  who 
have  tried  to  make  a saint  of  Columbus ; and 
under  the  influence  of  this  reaction  he  offers  us  a 
picture  of  the  great  navigator  that  serves  to  raise 
a pertinent  question.  No  one  can  deny  that  Las 
Casas  was  a keen  judge  of  men,  or  that  his  stan- 
dard of  right  and  wrong  was  quite  as  lofty  as  any 
one  has  reached  in  our  own  time.  He  had  a much 
more  intimate  knowledge  of  Columbus  than  any 
modern  historian  can  ever  hope  to  acquire,  and  he 


Xll 


PREFACE. 


always  speaks  of  him  with  warm  admiration  and 
respect.  But  how  could  Las  Casas  ever  have  re- 
spected the  feeble,  mean-spirited  driveller  whose 
portrait  Mr.  Winsor  asks  us  to  accept  as  that  of 
the  Discoverer  of  America  ? 

If,  however,  instead  of  his  biographical  estimate 
of  Columbus,  we  consider  Mr.  Winsor’ s contribu- 
tions toward  a correct  statement  of  the  difficult 
geographical  questions  connected  with  the  subject, 
we  recognize  at  once  the  work  of  an  acknowledged 
master  in  his  chosen  field.  It  is  work,  too,  of  the 
first  order  of  importance.  It  would  be  hard  to 
mention  a subject  on  which  so  many  reams  of  dire- 
ful nonsense  have  been  written  as  on  the  discovery 
of  America ; and  the  prolific  source  of  so  much 
folly  has  generally  been  what  Mr.  Freeman  fitly 
calls  “ bondage  to  the  modern  map.”  In  order  to 
understand  what  the  great  mariners  of  the  fifteenth 
and  sixteenth  centuries  were  trying  to  do,  and 
what  people  supposed  them  to  have  done,  one  must 
begin  by  resolutely  banishing  the  modern  map  from 
one’s  mind.  The  ancient  map  must  take  its  place, 
but  this  must  not  be  the  ridiculous  “ Orbis  Vete- 
ribus  Notus,”  to  be  found  in  the  ordinary  classical 
atlas,  which  simply  copies  the  outlines  of  coun- 
tries with  modern  accuracy  from  the  modern  map , 
and  then  scatters  ancient  names  over  them  ! Such 
maps  are  worse  than  useless.  In  dealing  with  the 
discovery  of  America  one  must  steadily  keep  before 


PREFACE. 


Xlll 


one’s  mind  the  quaint  notions  of  ancient  geogra- 
phers, especially  Ptolemy  and  Mela,  as  portrayed 
upon  such  maps  as  are  reproduced  in  the  present 
volume.  It  was  just  these  distorted  and  hazy  notions 
that  swayed  the  minds  and  guided  the  movements 
of  the  great  discoverers,  and  went  on  reproducing 
themselves  upon  newly-made  maps  for  a century 
or  more  after  the  time  of  Columbus.  Without 
constant  reference  to  these  old  maps  one  cannot 
begin  to  understand  the  circumstances  of  the  dis- 
covery of  America. 

In  no  way  can  one  get  at  the  heart  of  the  matter 
more  completely  than  by  threading  the  labyrinth 
of  causes  and  effects  through  which  the  western 
hemisphere  came  slowly  and  gradually  to  be  known 
by  the  name  America.  The  reader  will  not  fail  to 
observe  the  pains  which  I have  taken  to  elucidate 
this  subject,  not  from  any  peculiar  regard  for  Amer- 
icus  Yespucius,  but  because  the  quintessence  of  the 
whole  geographical  problem  of  the  discovery  of 
the  New  World  is  in  one  way  or  another  involved 
in  the  discussion.  I can  think  of  no  finer  instance 
of  the  queer  complications  that  can  come  to  sur- 
round and  mystify  an  increase  of  knowledge  too 
great  and  rapid  to  be  comprehended  by  a single 
generation  of  men. 

In  the  solution  of  the  problem  as  to  the  first 
Yespucius  voyage  I follow  the  lead  of  Yarnhagen, 
but  always  independently  and  with  the  documen- 


XIV 


PREFACE. 


tary  evidence  fully  in  sight.  For  some  years  I 
vainly  tried  to  pursue  Humboldt’s  clues  to  some 
intelligible  conclusion,  and  felt  inhospitably  in- 
clined toward  Yarnhagen’ s views  as  altogether 
too  plausible ; he  seemed  to  settle  too  many  diffi- 
culties at  once.  But  after  becoming  convinced 
of  the  spuriousness  of  the  Bandini  letter  (see 
below,  vol.  ii.  p.  94)  ; and  observing  how  the  air 
at  once  was  cleared  in  some  directions,  it  seemed 
that  further  work  in  textual  criticism  would  be 
well  bestowed.  I made  a careful  study  of  the  dic- 
tion of  the  letter  from  Vespucius  to  Soderini  in  its 
two  principal  texts  : — 1.  the  Latin  version  of 
1507,  the  original  of  which  is  in  the  library  of 
Harvard  University,  appended  to  Waldseemiiller’s 
44  Cosmographiae  Introductio  ” ; 2.  the  Italian  text 
reproduced  severally  by  Bandini,  Canovai,  and 
Yarnhagen,  from  the  excessively  rare  original,  of 
which  only  five  copies  are  now  known  to  be  in 
existence.  It  is  this  text  that  Yarnhagen  regards 
as  the  original  from  which  the  Latin  version  of 
1507  was  made,  through  an  intermediate  French 
version  now  lost.  In  this  opinion  Yarnhagen  does 
not  stand  alone,  as  Mr.  Winsor  seems  to  think 
(44  Christopher  Columbus,”  p.  540,  line  5 from 
bottom),  for  Harrisse  and  Avezac  have  expressed 
themselves  plainly  to  the  same  effect  (see  below, 
vol.  ii.  p.  42).  A minute  study  of  this  text, 
with  all  its  quaint  interpolations  of  Spanish  and 


PREFACE . 


XV 


Portuguese  idioms  and  seafaring  phrases  into  the 
Italian  ground-work  of  its  diction,  long  ago  con- 
vinced me  that  it  never  was  a translation  from  any- 
thing in  heaven  or  earth  or  the  waters  under  the 
earth.  Nobody  would  ever  have  translated  a docu- 
ment into  such  an  extremely  peculiar  and  individ- 
ual jargon.  It  is  most  assuredly  an  original  text, 
and  its  author  was  either  Yespucius  or  the  Old 
Nick.  It  was  by  starting  from  this  text  as  prim- 
itive that  Yarnhagen  started  correctly  in  his  inter- 
pretation of  the  statements  in  the  letter,  and  it 
was  for  that  reason  that  he  was  able  to  dispose  of 
so  many  difficulties  at  one  blow.  When  he  showed 
that  the  landfall  of  Yespucius  on  his  first  voyage 
was  near  Cape  Honduras  and  had  nothing  what- 
ever to  do  with  the  Pearl  Coast,  he  began  to  follow 
the  right  trail,  and  so  the  facts  which  had  puzzled 
everybody  began  at  once  to  fall  into  the  right 
places.  This  is  all  made  clear  in  the  seventh 
chapter  of  the  present  work,  where  the  general 
argument  of  Yarnhagen  is  in  many  points  strongly 
reinforced.  The  evidence  here  set  forth  in  con- 
nection with  the  Cantino  map  is  especially  signif- 
icant. 

It  is  interesting  on  many  accounts  to  see  the 
first  voyage  of  Yespucius  thus  elucidated,  though 
it  had  no  connection  with  the  application  of  his 
name  by  Waldseemiiller  to  an  entirely  different 
region  from  any  that  was  visited  upon  that  voyage. 


XVI 


PREFACE. 


The  real  significance  of  the  third  voyage  of  Ves- 
pucius,  in  connection  with  the  naming  of  America, 
is  now  set  forth,  I believe,  for  the  first  time  in  the 
light  thrown  upon  the  subject  by  the  opinions  of 
Ptolemy  and  Mela.  Neither  Humboldt  nor  Major 
nor  Harrisse  nor  Yarnhagen  seems  to  have  had  a 
firm  grasp  of  what  was  in  W aldseemiiller’s  mind 
when  he  wrote  the  passage  photographed  below  in 
vol.  ii.  p.  136  of  this  work.  It  is  only  when  we 
keep  the  Greek  and  Roman  theories  in  the  fore- 
ground and  unflinchingly  bar  out  that  intrusive 
modern  atlas,  that  we  realize  what  the  Freiburg 
geographer  meant  and  whv  Ferdinand  Columbus 
was  not  in  the  least  shocked  or  surprised. 

I have  at  various  times  given  lectures  on  the 
discovery  of  America  and  questions  connected 
therewith,  more  especially  at  University  College, 
London,  in  1879,  at  the  Philosophical  Institution 
in  Edinburgh,  in  1880,  at  the  Lowell  Institute 
in  Boston,  in  1890,  and  in  the  course  of  my  work 
as  professor  in  the  Washington  University  at  St. 
Louis  ; but  the  present  work  is  in  no  sense  what- 
ever a reproduction  of  such  lectures. 

Acknowledgments  are  due  to  Mr.  Winsor  for 
his  cordial  permission  to  make  use  of  a number  of 
reproductions  of  old  maps  and  facsimiles  already 
used  by  him  in  the  “ Narrative  and  Critical  His- 
tory of  America ; ” they  are  mentioned  in  the  lists 


PREFACE . 


XVII 


of  illustrations.  I have  also  to  thank  Dr.  Brinton 
for  allowing  me  to  reproduce  a page  of  old  Mexican 
music,  and  the  Hakluyt  Society  for  permission  to 
use  the  Zeno  and  Catalan  maps  and  the  view  of 
Kakortok  church.  Dr.  Fewkes  has  very  kindly 
favoured  me  with  a sight  of  proof-sheets  of  some 
recent  monographs  by  Bandelier.  And  for  cour- 
teous assistance  at  various  libraries  I have  most 
particularly  to  thank  Mr.  Kieraan  of  Harvard 
University,  Mr.  Appleton  Griffin  of  the  Boston 
Public  Library,  and  Mr.  Uhler  of  the  Peabody 
Institute  in  Baltimore. 

There  is  one  thing  which  I feel  obliged,  though 
with  extreme  hesitation  and  reluctance,  to  say  to 
my  readers  in  this  place,  because  the  time  has 
come  when  something  ought  to  be  said,  and  there 
seems  to  be  no  other  place  available  for  saying  it. 
For  many  years  letters  — often  in  a high  degree 
interesting  and  pleasant  to  receive  — have  been 
coming  to  me  from  persons  with  whom  I am  not 
acquainted,  and  I have  always  done  my  best  to 
answer  them.  It  is  a long  time  since  such  letters 
came  to  form  the  larger  part  of  a voluminous  mass 
of  correspondence.  The  physical  fact  has  assumed 
dimensions  with  which  it  is  no  longer  possible  to 
cope.  If  I were  to  answer  all  the  letters  which 
arrive  by  every  mail,  I should  never  be  able  to  do 
another  day’s  work.  It  is  becoming  impossible 


XV111 


PREFACE. 


even  to  read  them  all ; and  there  is  scarcely  time 
for  giving  due  attention  to  one  in  ten.  Kind 
friends  and  readers  will  thus  understand  that  if 
their  queries  seem  to  be  neglected,  it  is  by  no 
means  from  any  want  of  good  will,  but  simply  from 
the  lamentable  fact  that  the  day  contains  only 
four-and-twenty  hours. 


Cambridge,  October  25,  1891. 


CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  I. 

ANCIENT  AMERICA. 

PA 

The  American  aborigines 1 

Question  as  to  their  origin 2, 3 

Antiquity  of  man  in  America 4 

Shell-mounds,  or  middens 4, 5 

The  Glacial  Period  . 6, 7 

Discoveries  in  the  Trenton  gravel  ....  8 

Discoveries  in  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Minnesota  . . 9 

Mr.  Cresson’s  discovery  at  Claymont,  Delaware  . . 10 

The  Calaveras  skull 11 

Pleistocene  nien  and  mammals  . . . . 12, 13 

Elevation  and  subsidence 13, 14 

Waves  of  migration 15 

The  Cave  men  of  Europe  in  the  Glacial  Period  . . 16 

The  Eskimos  are  probably  a remnant  of  the  Cave  men  17-19 
There  was  probably  no  connection  or  intercourse  by 
water  between  ancient  America  and  the  Old  World  . 20 

There  is  one  great  American  red  race  ....  21 

Different  senses  iu  which  the  word  “ race  ” is  used  21-23 
No  necessary  connection  between  differences  in  culture 

and  differences  in  race 23 

Mr.  Lewis  Morgan’s  classification  of  grades  of  cul- 
ture   24-32 

Distinction  between  Savagery  and  Barbarism  . . 25 

Origin  of  pottery  .......  25 

Lower,  middle,  and  upper  status  of  savagery  . . 26 

Lower  status  of  barbarism  ; it  ended  differently  in  the 
two  hemispheres  ; in  ancient  America  there  was  no 
pastoral  stage  of  development . ....  27 


XX 


CONTENTS. 


Importance  of  Indian  corn 28 

Tillage  with  irrigation 29 

Use  of  adobe-brick  and  stone  in  building  . . . 29 

Middle  status  of  barbarism 29,  30 

Stone  and  copper  tools 30 

Working  of  metals  ; smelting  of  iron  ....  30 

Upper  status  of  barbarism 31 

The  alphabet  and  the  beginnings  of  civilization  . . 32 

So-called  “ civilizations  ” of  Mexico  and  Peru  . 33,  34 

Loose  use  of  the  words  “ savagery  ” and  “ civilization  ” 35 

Value  and  importance  of  the  term  “ barbarism  ” . 35,  36 

The  status  of  barbarism  is  most  completely  exemplified 

in  ancient  America 36,  37 

Survival  of  bygone  epochs  of  culture  ; work  of  the 

Bureau  of  Ethnology 37, 38 

Tribal  society  and  multiplicity  of  languages  in  aborigi- 
nal America  . . . . . . . 38, 39 

Tribes  in  the  upper  status  of  savagery  ; Athabaskans, 

Apaches,  Shoshones,  etc 39 

Tribes  in  the  lower  status  of  barbarism  ; the  Dakota 

group  or  family 40 

The  Minnitarees  and  Mandans 41 

The  Pawnee  and  Arickaree  group  ....  42 

The  Maskoki  group 42 

The  Algonquin  group 43 

The  Huron-Iroquois  group 44 

The  Five  Nations  ......  45-47 

Distinction  between  horticulture  and  field  agriculture  . 48 

Perpetual  intertribal  warfare,  with  torture  and  canni- 
balism ........  49-51 

Myths  and  folk-lore 51 

Ancient  law  .......  52, 53 

The  patriarchal  family  not  primitive  ....  53 

“ Mother-right  ” . . . . . . . .54 

Primitive  marriage  . 55 

The  system  of  reckoning  kinship  through  females  only  56 

Original  reason  for  the  system 57 

The  primeval  human  horde 58, 69 

Earliest  family-group  ; the  clan  .....  60 

“ Exogamy  ” 60 


CONTENTS. 


xxi 


Phratry  and  tribe 61 

Effect  of  pastoral  life  upon  property  and  upon  the 

family 61-63 

The  exogamous  clan  in  ancient  America  ...  64 

Intimate  connection  of  aboriginal  architecture  with 

social  life 65 

The  long  houses  of  the  Iroquois  . . . . 66, 67 

Summary  divorce 68 

Hospitality 68 

Structure  of  the  clan 69,  70 

Origin  and  structure  of  the  phratry  . . . 70,  71 

Structure  of  the  tribe 72 

Cross-relationships  between  clans  and  tribes  ; the  Iro- 
quois Confederacy 72-74 

Structure  of  the  confederacy  . . . . 75, 76 

The  “ Long  House  ” 76 

Symmetrical  development  of  institutions  in  ancient 

America 77,  78 

Circular  houses  of  the  Mandans  ....  79-81 

The  Indians  of  the  pueblos,  in  the  middle  status  of 

barbarism 82, 83 

Horticulture  with  irrigation,  and  architecture  with 


adobe  

... 

83,84 

Possible  origin  of  adobe  architecture 

. 

84,85 

Mr.  Cushing’s  sojourn  at  Zuni 

. 

. 86 

Typical  structure  of  the  pueblo  . 

. 

86-88 

Pueblo  society  .... 

. 

. 89 

Wonderful  ancient  pueblos  in  the  Chaco  valley  . 

90-92 

The  Moqui  pueblos 

. 

. 93 

The  cliff-dwellings 

. 

. 93 

Pueblo  of  Zuni  .... 

... 

93,94 

Pueblo  of  Tlascala 

. . . 

94-96 

The  ancient  city  of  Mexico  was  a 

great  composite 

pueblo 97 

The  Spanish  discoverers  could  not  be  expected  to  un- 
derstand the  state  of  society  which  they  found 

there 97, 98 

Contrast  between  feudalism  and  gentilism  ...  98 

Change  from  gentile  society  to  political  society  in 
Greece  and  Rome 99, 100 


XXII 


CONTENTS. 


First  suspicions  as  to  the  erroneousness  of  the  Spanish 


accounts 101 

Detection  and  explanation  of  the  errors,  by  Lewis 

Morgan 102 

Adolf  Bandelier’s  researches 103 

The  Aztec  Confederacy 104, 105 

Aztec  clans 106 

Clan  officers 107 

Rights  and  duties  of  the  clan  .....  108 

Aztec  phratries  108 

The  tlatocan,  or  tribal  council 109 

The  cihuacoatl,  or  “ snake-woman  ” 110 

The  tlacatecuhtli,  or  “ chief-of-men  ” . . . . Ill 

Evolution  of  kingship  in  Greece  and  Rome  . . . 112 

Mediaeval  kingship 113 

Montezuma  was  a “priest-commander ” . . . 114 

Mode  of  succession  to  the  office  ....  114, 115 

Manner  of  collecting  tribute 116 

Mexican  roads 117 

Aztec  and  Iroquois  confederacies  contrasted  . .118 

Aztec  priesthood ; human  sacrifices  . . . 119, 120 

Aztec  slaves . 121, 122 

The  Aztec  family 122, 123 

Aztec  property 124 

Mr.  Morgan’s  rules  of  criticism 125 

He  sometimes  disregarded  his  own  rules  . . . 126 


Amusing  illustrations  from  his  remarks  on  “ Monte- 
zuma’s Dinner  ” 126-128 

The  reaction  against  uncritical  and  exaggerated  state- 
ments was  often  carried  too  far  by  Mr.  Morgan  128, 129 
Great  importance  of  the  middle  period  of  barbarism  . 130 


The  Mexicans  compared  with  the  Mayas  . . 131-133 

Maya  hieroglyphic  writing 132 

Ruined  cities  of  Central  America  . . . 134-138 

They  are  probably  not  older  than  the  twelfth  century  136 
Recent  discovery  of  the  Chronicle  of  Chicxulub  . . 138 

Maya  culture  very  closely  related  to  Mexican  . . 139 

The  “ Mound-Builders  ”.....  140-146 

The  notion  that  they  were  like  the  Aztecs  . . . 142 

Or,  perhaps,  like  the  Zunis  .....  143 


CONTENTS. 


XXlll 


These  notions  are  not  well  sustained  ....  144 

The  mounds  were  probably  built  by  different  peoples 
in  the  lower  status  of  barbarism,  by  Cherokees, 
Shawnees,  and  other  tribes  ....  144, 145 

It  is  not  likely  that  there  was  a “ race  of  Mound  Build- 
ers ” 146 

Society  in  America  at  the  time  of  the  Discovery  had 
reached  stages  similar  to  stages  reached  by  east- 
ern Mediterranean  peoples  fifty  or  sixty  centuries 
earlier 146, 147 


CHAPTER  II. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


Stories  of  voyages  to  America  before  Columbus  ; the 


Chinese  . . 148 

The  Irish 149 

Blowing  and  drifting  ; Cousin,  of  Dieppe  . . . 150 

These  stories  are  of  small  value 150 

But  the  case  of  the  Northmen  is  quite  different  . . 151 

The  Viking  exodus  from  Norway  . . . 151, 152 

Founding  of  a colony  in  Iceland,  A.  D.  874  . . . 153 

Icelandic  literature  .......  154 

Discovery  of  Greenland,  A.  d.  876  . . . 155, 156 

Eric  the  Red,  and  his  colony  in  Greenland,  a.  d. 


986  157-161 

Voyage  of  Bjarni  Herjulfsson 162 


Conversion  of  the  Northmen  to  Christianity  . . 163 

Leif  Ericsson’s  voyage,  A.  d.  1000 ; Helluland  and 


Markland 164 

Leif’s  winter  in  Vinland 165, 166 

Voyages  of  Thorvald  and  Thorstein  ....  167 
Thorfinn  Karlsefni,  and  his  unsuccessful  attempt  to 
found  a colony  in  Vinland,  A.  d.  1007-10  . 167-169 

Freydis,  and  her  evil  deeds  in  Vinland,  1011-12  170,  171 

Voyage  into  Baffin’s  Bay,  1135 172 

Description  of  a Viking  ship  discovered  at  Sandefiord, 
in  Norway 173-175 


XXIV 


CONTENTS. 


To  what  extent  the  climate  of  Greenland  may  have 
changed  within  the  last  thousand  years  . . 176, 177 

With  the  Northmen  once  in  Greenland,  the  discovery 


of  the  American  continent  was  inevitable 

. 178 

Ear-marks  of  truth  in  the  Icelandic  narratives 

. 179, 180 

Northern  limit  of  the  vine  .... 

. 181 

Length  of  the  winter  day  .... 

. 182 

Indian  corn  ...... 

. 182, 183 

Winter  weather  in  Vinland  .... 

. 184 

Vinland  was  probably  situated  somewhere  between 

Cape  Breton  and  Point  Judith  . 

. 185 

Further  ear-marks  of  truth  ; savages  and  barbarians 
of  the  lower  status  were  unknown  to  mediaeval  Eu- 
ropeans   185, 186 

The  natives  of  Vinland  as  described  in  the  Icelandic 

narratives  . 187-193 

Meaning  of  the  epithet  “ Skraelings  ” . . . 188, 189 

Personal  appearance  of  the  Skraelings  ....  189 

The  Skraelings  of  Vinland  were  Indians,  — very  likely 
Algonquins  ........  190 

The  “balista”  or  “ demon’s  head”  . . . 191,192 

The  story  of  the  “ uniped  ” 193 

Character  of  the  Icelandic  records  ; misleading  asso- 
ciations with  the  word  “ saga  ” ....  194 

The  comparison  between  Leif  Ericsson  and  Agamem- 
non, made  by  a committee  of  the  Massachusetts  His- 
torical Society,  was  peculiarly  unfortunate  and  in- 
appropriate . 194, 197 

The  story  of  the  Trojan  War,  in  the  shape  in  which  we 

find  it  in  Greek  poetry,  is  pure  folk-lore  . . . 195 

The  Saga  of  Eric  the  Red  is  not  folk-lore  . . . 196 

Mythical  and  historical  sagas  .....  197 

The  western  or  Hauks-b<5k  version  of  Eric  the  Red’s 

Saga 198 

The  northern  or  Flateyar-b6k  version  ....  199 

Presumption  against  sources  not  contemporary  . . 200 

Hauk  Erlendsson  and  his  manuscripts  . . . 201 

The  story  is  not  likely  to  have  been  preserved  to 
Hauk’s  time  by  oral  tradition  only  ....  202 

Allusions  to  Vinland  in  other  Icelandic  documents  202-207 


CONTENTS. 


xxv 


Eyrbyggja  Saga .203 

The  abbot  Nikulas,  etc 204 

Ari  Frbdhi  and  his  works 204 

His  significant  allusion  to  Vinland  ....  205 

Other  references 206 

Differences  between  Hauks-b6k  and  Flateyar-bbk  ver- 
sions . 207 

Adam  of  Bremen 208 

Importance  of  his  testimony 209 

His  misconception  of  the  situation  of  Vinland  . . 210 

Summary  of  the  argument 211-213 

Absurd  speculations  of  zealous  antiquarians  . 213-215 

The  Dighton  inscription  was  made  by  Algonquins,  and 
has  nothing  to  do  with  the  Northmen  . . 213, 214 

Governor  Arnold’s  stone  windmill  ....  215 

There  is  no  reason  for  supposing  that  the  Northmen 

founded  a colony  in  Vinland 216 

No  archaeological  remains  of  them  have  been  found 

south  of  Davis  strait 217 

If  the  Northmen  had  founded  a successful  colony,  they 
would  have  introduced  domestic  cattle  into  the  North 

American  fauna 218 

And  such  animals  could  not  have  vanished  and  left  no 

trace  of  their  existence 219, 220 

Further  fortunes  of  the  Greenland  colony  . . . 221 

Bishop  Eric’s  voyage  in  search  of  Vinland,  1121  . . 222 

The  ship  from  Markland,  1347  223 

The  Greenland  colony  attacked  by  Eskimos,  1349  . 224 

Queen  Margaret’s  monopoly,  and  its  baneful  effects  . 225 

Story  of  the  Venetian  brothers,  Nicolb  and  Antonio 

Zeno 226 

Nicolb  Zeno  wrecked  upon  one  of  the  Faeroe  islands  . 227 

He  enters  the  service  of  Henry  Sinclair,  Earl  of  the 

Orkneys  and  Caithness 228 

Nicolb’s  voyage  to  Greenland,  cir.  1394  . . . 229 

Voyage  of  Earl  Sinclair  and  Antonio  Zeno  . . 229,  230 

Publication  of  the  remains  of  the  documents  by  the 

younger  Nicolb  Zeno,  1558  231 

The  Zeno  map 232, 233 

Queer  transformations  of  names  ....  234-236 


XXVI 


CONTENTS. 


The  name  Fceroislander  became  Frislanda  . 

The  narrative  nowhere  makes  a claim  to  the  “ dis- 
covery of  America  ” ...... 

The  “ Zichmni  ” of  the  narrative  means  Henry  Sin- 
clair ......... 

Bardsen’s  “ Description  of  Greenland  ”... 
The  monastery  of  St.  Olaus  and  its  hot  spring 
Volcanoes  of  the  north  Atlantic  ridge  .... 

Fate  of  Gunnbjorn’s  Skerries,  1456  .... 

Volcanic  phenomena  in  Greenland  . . . 242, 

Estotiland 

Drogio 

Inhabitants  of  Drogio  and  the  countries  beyond  . 

The  Fisherman’s  return  to  Frislanda  .... 
Was  the  account  of  Drogio  woven  into  the  narrative 

by  the  younger  Nicolb  ? 

Or  does  it  represent  actual  experiences  in  North 

America  ? 

The  case  of  David  Ingram,  1568 

The  case  of  Cabeza  de  Vaca,  1528-36  .... 
There  may  have  been  unrecorded  instances  of  visits  to 

North  America 

The  pre-Columbian  voyages  made  no  real  contributions 

to  geographical  knowledge 

And  were  in  no  true  sense  a discovery  of  America 
Real  contact  between  the  eastern  and  western  hemi- 
sphere was  first  established  by  Columbus 


236 

237 

238 

239 

240 

241 

242 

243 

244 

245 

246 

247 

248 

249 

250 

251 

252 

253 

254 

255 


ILLUSTRATIONS. 


Portrait  of  the  author  . . . Frontispiece 

View  and  ground-plan  of  Seneca-Iroquois  long  house 
reduced  from  Morgan’s  Houses  and  House-Life  of  the 

American  Aborigines 

View,  cross-section,  and  ground-plan  of  Mandan  round 

house,  ditto 

Ground-plan  of  Pueblo  Hungo  Pavie,  ditto  . 

Restoration  of  Pueblo  Hungo  Pavie,  ditto  . 

Restoration  of  Pueblo  Bonito,  ditto  .... 
Ground-plan  of  Pueblo  Penasca  Blanca,  ditto 
Ground-plan  of  so-called  " House  of  the  Nuns  ” at 

Uxmal,  ditto 

Map  of  the  East  Bygd,  or  eastern  settlement  of  the 
Northmen  in  Greenland,  reduced  from  Rafn’s  Anti- 

quitates  Americance 160, 

Ruins  of  the  church  at  Kakortok,  from  Major’s  Voyages 
of  the  Zeni , published  by  the  Hakluyt  Society 
Zeno  Map,  cir.  1400,  ditto 232, 


PAGE 

66 

80 

86 

88 

90 

92 

133 

161 

222 

233 


■ 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


CHAPTER  I. 

ANCIENT  AMERICA. 

When  the  civilized  people  of  Europe  first  be- 
came acquainted  with  the  continents  of  North  and 
South  America,  they  found  them  inhabited  by  a 
race  of  men  quite  unlike  any  of  the  races  with 
which  they  were  familiar  in  the  Old  World.  Be- 
tween the  various  tribes  of  this  aboriginal  Ameri- 
can race,  except  in  the  sub-arctic  region,  The  American 
there  is  now  seen  to  be  a general  phys-  aborigilie8- 
ical  likeness,  such  as  to  constitute  an  American 
type  of  mankind  as  clearly  recognizable  as  those 
types  which  we  call  Mongolian  and  Malay,  though 
far  less  pronounced  than  such  types  as  the  Aus- 
tralian or  the  negro.  The  most  obvious  charac- 
teristics possessed  in  common  by  the  American 
aborigines  are  the  copper-coloured  or  rather  the 
cinnamon-coloured  complexion,  along  with  the  high 
cheek-bones  and  small  deepset  eyes,  the  straight 
black  hair  and  absence  or  scantiness  of  beard. 
With  regard  to  stature,  length  of  limbs,  massive- 
ness of  frame,  and  shape  of  skull,  considerable 


2 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


divergencies  may  be  noticed  among  the  various 
American  tribes,  as  indeed  is  also  the  case  among 
the  members  of  the  white  race  in  Europe,  and  of 
other  races.  With  regard  to  culture  the  differ- 
ences have  been  considerable,  although,  with  two 
or  three  apparent  but  not  real  exceptions,  there 
was  nothing  in  pre-Columbian  America  that  could 
properly  be  called  civilization  ; the  general  condi- 
tion of  the  people  ranged  all  the  way  from  sav- 
agery to  barbarism  of  a high  type. 

Soon  after  America  was  proved  not  to  be  part 
of  Asia,  a puzzling  question  arose.  Whence  came 
these  “ Indians,”  and  in  what  manner  did  they  find 
their  way  to  the  western  hemisphere.  Since  the 
beginning  of  the  present  century  discoveries  in 
geology  have  entirely  altered  our  mental  attitude 
toward  this  question.  It  was  formerly  argued 
upon  the  two  assumptions  that  the  geographical 
relations  of  land  and  water  had  been  always  pretty 
much  the  same  as  we  now  find  them,  and  that  all 
the  racial  differences  among  men  have  arisen  since 
the  date  of  the  “ Noachian  Deluge,”  which  was 
Question  as  to  generally  placed  somewhere  between 
their  origin,  two  and  three  thousand  years  before 

the  Christian  era.  Hence  inasmuch  as  Euro- 
pean tradition  knows  nothing  of  any  such  race  as 
the  Indians,  it  was  supposed  that  at  some  time 
within  the  historic  period  they  must  have  moved 
eastward  from  Asia  into  America ; and  thus 
“ there  was  felt  to  be  a sort  of  speculative  neces- 
sity for  discovering  points  of  resemblance  between 
American  languages,  myths,  and  social  observances 
and  those  of  the  Oriental  world.  Now  the  abori- 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


3 


gines  of  this  Continent  were  made  out  to  be  Kam- 
tchatkans,  and  now  Chinamen,  and  again  they  were 
shown,  with  quaint  erudition,  to  be  remnants  of 
the  ten  tribes  of  Israel.  Perhaps  none  of  these 
theories  have  been  exactly  disproved,  but  they 
have  all  been  superseded  and  laid  on  the  shelf.”  1 

1 See  my  Excursions  of  an  Evolutionist , p.  148.  A good  suc- 
cinct account  of  these  various  theories,  monuments  of  wasted  in- 
genuity, is  given  in  Short’s  North  Americans  of  Antiquity , chap, 
iii.  The  most  elaborate  statement  of  the  theory  of  an  Israelite 
colonization  of  America  is  to  he  found  in  the  ponderous  tomes  of 
Lord  Kingsborough,  Mexican  Antiquities , London,  1831-48, 9 vols. 
elephant-folio.  Such  a theory  was  entertained  by  the  author  of 
that  curious  piece  of  literary  imposture,  The  Book  of  Mormon.  In 
this  hook  we  are  told  that,  when  the  tongues  were  confounded 
at  Babel,  the  Lord  selected  a certain  Jared,  with  his  family  and 
friends,  and  instructed  them  to  build  eight  ships,  in  which,  after 
a voyage  of  344  days,  they  were  brought  to  America,  where  they 
“did  build  many  mighty  cities,”  and  “prosper  exceedingly.” 
But  after  some  centuries  they  perished  because  of  their  iniquities. 
In  the  reign  of  Zedekiab,  when  calamity  was  impending  over 
Judah,  two  brothers,  Nephi  and  Laman,  under  divine  guidance 
led  a colony  to  America.  There,  says  the  veracious  chronicler, 
their  descendants  became  great  nations,  and  worked  in  iron,  and 
had  stuffs  of  silk,  besides  keeping  plenty  of  oxen  and  sheep. 
{Ether,  ix.  18,  19;  x.  23,  24.)  Christ  appeared  and  wrought 
many  wonderful  works;  people  spake  with  tongues,  and  the 
dead  were  raised.  (3  Nephi,  xxvi.  14,  15.)  But  about  the  close 
of  the  fourth  century  of  our  era,  a terrible  war  between  Laman- 
ites  and  Nephites  ended  in  the  destruction  of  the  latter.  Some 
two  million  warriors,  with  their  wives  and  children,  having  been 
slaughtered,  the  prophet  Mormon  escaped,  with  his  son  Moroni, 
to  the  “hill  Cumorah,”  hard  by  the  “ waters  of  Ripliancum,”  or 
Lake  Ontario.  {Ether,  xv.  2,  8,  11.)  There  they  hid  the  sacred 
tablets,  which  remained  concealed  until  they  were  miraculously 
discovered  and  translated  by  Joseph  Smith  in  1827.  There  is,  of 
course,  no  element  of  tradition  in  this  story.  It  is  all  pure  fiction, 
and  of  a very  clumsy  sort,  such  as  might  easily  be  devised  by  an 
ignorant  man  accustomed  to  the  language  of  the  Bible  ; and  of 
course  it  was  suggested  by  the  old  notion  of  the  Israelitish  origin 
of  the  red  men.  The  references  are  to  The  Book  of  Mormon,  Salt 
Lake  City  : Deseret  News  Co.,  1885. 


4 


THE  DISCOVEBY  OF  AMEBIC  A. 


The  tendency  of  modern  discovery  is  indeed  to- 
ward agreement  with  the  time-honoured  tradition 
which  makes  the  Old  World,  and  perhaps  Asia, 
the  earliest  dwelling-place  of  mankind.  Competi- 
tion has  been  far  more  active  in  the  fauna  of  the 
eastern  hemisphere  than  in  that  of  the  western, 
natural  selection  has  accordingly  resulted  in  the 
evolution  of  higher  forms,  and  it  is  there  that  we 
find  both  extinct  and  surviving  species  of  man's 
nearest  collateral  relatives,  those  tailless  half- 
human apes,  the  gorilla,  chimpanzee,  orang,  and 
gibbon.  It  is  altogether  probable  that  the  people 
whom  the  Spaniards  found  in  America  came  by 
migration  from  the  Old  World.  But  it  is  by  no 
means  probable  that  their  migration  occurred 
within  so  short  a period  as  five  or  six  thousand 
Antiquity  of  years.  A series  of  observations  and 
America.  discoveries  kept  up  for  the  last  half- 

century  seem  to  show  that  North  America  has  been 
continuously  inhabited  by  human  beings  since  the 
earliest  Pleistocene  times,  if  not  earlier. 

The  first  group  of  these  observations  and  dis- 
coveries relate  to  “ middens  ” or  shell-heaps.  On 
the  banks  of  the  Damariscotta  river  in  Maine  are 
some  of  the  most  remarkable  shell-heaps  in  the 
world.  With  an  average  thickness  of  six  or  seven 
feet,  they  rise  in  places  to  a height  of  twenty-five 
feet.  They  consist  almost  entirely  of 
huge  oyster-shells  often  ten  inches  in 
length  and  sometimes  much  longer.  The  shells 
belong  to  a salt-water  species.  In  some  places 
“ there  is  an  appearance  of  stratification  covered 
by  an  alternation  of  shells  and  earth,  as  if  the 


Shell-mounds. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


5 


deposition  of  shells  had  been  from  time  to  time  in- 
terrupted, and  a vegetable  mould  had  covered  the 
surface.”  In  these  heaps  have  been  found  frag- 
ments of  pottery  and  of  the  bones  of  such  edible 
animals  as  the  moose  and  deer.  “ At  the  very 
foundation  of  one  of  the  highest  heaps,”  in  a sit- 
uation which  must  for  long  ages  have  been  undis- 
turbed, Mr.  Edward  Morse  “ found  the  remains  of 
an  ancient  fire-place,  where  he  exhumed  charcoal, 
bones,  and  pottery.” 1 The  significant  circum- 
stance is  that  “at  the  present  time  oysters  are 
only  found  in  very  small  numbers,  too  small  to 
make  it  an  object  to  gather  them,”  and  so  far  as 
memory  and  tradition  can  reach,  such  seems  to 
have  been  the  case.  The  great  size  of  the  heap, 
coupled  with  the  notable  change  in  the  distribution 
of  this  mollusk  since  the  heap  was  abandoned,  im- 
plies a very  considerable  lapse  of  time  since  the 
vestiges  of  human  occupation  were  first  left  here. 
Similar  conclusions  have  been  drawn  from  the 
banks  or  mounds  of  shells  on  the  St.  John’s  river 
in  Florida,2  on  the  Alabama  river,  at  Grand  Lake 
on  the  lower  Mississippi,  and  at  San  Pablo  in  the 
bay  of  San  Francisco.  Thus  at  various  points 
from  Maine  to  California,  and  in  connection  with 
one  particular  kind  of  memorial,  we  find  records 
of  the  presence  of  man  at  a period  undoubtedly 
prehistoric,  but  not  necessarily  many  thousands  of 
years  old. 

1 Second  Annual  Report  of  the  Peabody  Museum  of  American 
Archaeology,  etc.,  p.  18. 

2 Visited  in  1866-74  by  Professor  Jeffries  Wyman,  and  described 
in  his  Fresh-Water  Shell  Mounds  of  the  St.  John's  River,  Cam- 
bridge, 1875. 


6 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  second  group  of  discoveries  carries  us  back 
much  farther,  even  into  the  earlier  stages  of  that 
widespread  glaciation  which  was  the  most  remark- 
able feature  of  the  Pleistocene  period.  At  the 
periods  of  greatest  cold  “ the  continent  of  North 
The  oiaciai  America  was  deeply  swathed  in  ice  as 
Period.  far  south  as  the  latitude  of  Philadel- 
phia, while  glaciers  descended  into  North  Caro- 
lina.” 1 The  valleys  of  the  Rocky  Mountains  also 
supported  enormous  glaciers,  and  a similar  state  of 
things  existed  at  the  same  time  in  Europe.  These 
periods  of  intense  cold  were  alternated  with  long 
interglacial  periods  during  which  the  climate  was 
warmer  than  it  is  to-day.  Concerning  the  anti- 
quity of  the  Pleistocene  age,  which  was  character- 
ized by  such  extraordinary  vicissitudes  of  heat  and 
cold,  there  has  been,  as  in  all  questions  relating  to 
geological  time,  much  conflict  of  opinion.  Twenty 
years  ago  geologists  often  argued  as  if  there  were 
an  unlimited  fund  of  past  time  upon  which  to 
draw ; but  since  Sir  William  Thomson  and  other 
physicists  emphasized  the  point  that  in  an  anti- 
quity very  far  from  infinite  this  earth  must  have 
been  a molten  mass,  there  has  been  a reaction. 
In  many  instances  further  study  has  shown  that 
less  time  was  needed  in  order  to  effect  a given 
change  than  had  formerly  been  supposed ; and  so 
there  has  grown  up  a tendency  to  shorten  the  time 
assigned  to  geological  periods.  Here,  as  in  so 
many  other  cases,  the  truth  is  doubtless  to  be 
sought  within  the  extremes.  If  we  adopt  the 
magnificent  argument  of  Dr.  Croll,  which  seems 

1 Excursions  of  an  Evolutionist , p.  39. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


7 


to  me  still  to  hold  its  ground  against  all  adverse 
criticism,1  and  regard  the  Glacial  epoch  as  coin- 
cident with  the  last  period  of  high  eccentricity  of 
the  earth’s  orbit,  we  obtain  a result  that  is  moder- 
ate and  probable.  That  astronomical  period  be- 
gan about  240,000  years  ago  and  came  to  an  end 
about  80,000  years  ago.  During  this  period  the 
eccentricity  was  seldom  less  than  .04,  and  at  one 
time  rose  to  .0569.  At  the  present  time  the  eccen- 
tricity is  .0168,  and  nearly  800,000  years  will  pass 
before  it  attains  such  a point  as  it  reached  during 
the  Glacial  epoch.  For  the  last  50,000  years  the 
departure  of  the  earth’s  orbit  from  a circular  form 
has  been  exceptionally  small. 

Now  the  traces  of  the  existence  of  men  in  North 
America  during  the  Glacial  epoch  have  in  recent 
years  been  discovered  in  abundance,  as  for  exam- 
ple, the  palaeolithic  quartzite  implements  found 
in  the  drift  near  the  city  of  St.  Paul,  which  date 
from  toward  the  close  of  the  Glacial  epoch  ; 2 the 
fragment  of  a human  jaw  found  in  the  red  clay 
deposited  in  Minnesota  during  an  earlier  part  of 

1 Croll,  Climate  and  Time  in  their  Geological  Relations , New 
York,  1875 ; Discussions  on  Climate  and  Cosmology , New  York, 
1886  ; Archibald  Geikie,  Text  Booh  of  Geology , pp.  23-29,  883- 
909,  London,  1882  ; James  Geikie,  The  Great  Ice  Age , pp.  94-136, 
New  York,  1874 ; Prehistoric  Europe , pp.  558-562,  London,  1881 ; 
Wallace,  Island  Life , pp.  101-225,  New  York,  1881.  Some  objec- 
tions to  Croll’ s theory  may  be  found  in  Wright’s  Ice  Age  in  North 
America , pp.  405-505,  585-595,  New  York,  1889.  I have  given 
a brief  account  of  the  theory  in  my  Excursions  of  an  Evolutionist , 
pp.  57-76. 

2 See  Miss  F.  E.  Babbitt,  “Vestiges  of  Glacial  Man  in  Minne- 
sota,” in  Proceedings  of  the  American  Association , vol.  xxxii-, 
1883. 


8 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


that  epoch;1  the  noble  collection  of  palseoliths 
found  by  Dr.  C.  C.  Abbott  in  the  Trenton  gravels 
in  New  Jersey ; and  the  more  recent  discoveries 
of  Dr.  Metz  and  Mr.  H.  T.  Cresson. 

The  year  187 8 marks  an  era  in  American  archae- 
ology as  memorable  as  the  year  1841  in  the  in- 
vestigation of  the  antiquity  of  man  in  Europe. 
With  reference  to  these  problems  Dr.  Abbott 
occupies  a position  similar  to  that  of  Boucher  de 
Perthes  in  the  Old  World,  and  the  Trenton  valley 
is  coming  to  be  classic  ground,  like  the  valley  of 
the  Somme.  In  April,  1873,  Dr.  Abbott  published 
his  description  of  three  rude  implements  which  he 
had  found  some  sixteen  feet  below  the  surface  of 
the  ground  “ in  the  gravels  of  a bluff  overlooking 
the  Delaware  river.”  The  implements 

Discoveries  in  . _ . - . - , - 

the  Trenton  were  m place  m an  undisturbed  deposit, 
and  could  not  have  found  their  way 
thither  in  any  recent  time ; Dr.  Abbott  assigned 
them  to  the  age  of  the  Glacial  drift.  This  was 
the  beginning  of  a long  series  of  investigations, 
in  which  Dr.  Abbott’s  work  was  assisted  and  sup- 
plemented by  Messrs.  Whitney,  Carr,  Putnam, 
Shaler,  Lewis,  Wright,  Haynes,  Dawkins,  and 
other  eminent  geologists  and  archaeologists.  By 
1888  Dr.  Abbott  had  obtained  not  less  than  60 
implements  from  various  recorded  depths  in  the 
gravel,  while  many  others  were  found  at  depths 
not  recorded  or  in  the  talus  of  the  banks.2  Three 
human  skulls  and  other  bones,  along  with  the  tusk 

1 See  N.  H.  Winchell,  Annual  Report  of  the  State  Geologist  of 
Minnesota , 1877,  p.  60. 

2 Wright’s  Ice  Age  in  North  America , p.  516. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


9 


of  a mastodon,  have  been  discovered  in  the  same 
gravel.  Careful  studies  have  been  made  of  the 
conditions  under  which  the  gravel-banks  were  de- 
posited and  their  probable  age  ; and  it  is  generally 
agreed  that  they  date  from  the  later  portion  of 
the  Glacial  period,  or  about  the  time  of  the  final 
recession  of  the  ice-sheet  from  this  region.  At 
that  time,  in  its  climate  and  general  aspect,  New 
York  harbour  must  have  been  much  like  a Green- 
land fiord  of  the  present  day.  In  1883  Professor 
Wright  of  Oberlin,  after  a careful  study  of  the 
Trenton  deposits  and  their  relations  to  the  terrace 
and  gravel  deposits  to  the  westward,  predicted 
that  similar  palaeolithic  implements  would  be 
found  in  Ohio.  Two  years  afterward,  the  predic- 
tion was  verified  by  Dr.  Metz,  who  found  a true 
palaeolith  of  black  flint  at  Madisonville,  in  the 
Little  Miami  valley,  eight  feet  below  the  surface. 
Since  then  further  discoveries  have  been  made  in 
the  same  neighbourhood  by  Dr.  Metz,  and  in  Jack- 
son  county,  Indiana,  by  Mr.  H.  T.  Cres-  Disc0Terie,  in 
son ; and  the  existence  of  man  in  that 
part  of  America  toward  the  close  of  the  80ta; 
Glacial  period  may  be  regarded  as  definitely  es- 
tablished. The  discoveries  of  Miss  Babbitt  and 
Professor  Winchell,  in  Minnesota,  carry  the  con- 
clusion still  farther,  and  add  to  the  probability  of 
the  existence  of  a human  population  all  the  way 
from  the  Atlantic  coast  to  the  upper  Mississippi 
valley  at  that  remote  antiquity. 

A still  more  remarkable  discovery  was  made  by 
Mr.  Cresson  in  July,  1887,  at  Claymont,  in  the 
north  of  Delaware.  In  a deep  cut  of  the  Balti- 


10  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

more  and  Ohio  Railroad,  in  a stratum  of  Phila- 
and  in  Deia-  delphia  red  gravel  and  brick  clay,  Mr. 
ware.  Cresson  obtained  an  unquestionable  pa- 

lseolith,  and  a few  months  afterward  his  diligent 
search  was  rewarded  with  another.1  This  forma- 
tion dates  from  far  back  in  the  Glacial  period. 
If  we  accept  Dr.  Croll’s  method  of  reckoning,  we 
can  hardly  assign  to  it  an  antiquity  less  than 

150.000  years. 

1 The  chipped  implements  discovered  by  Messrs.  Abbott,  Metz, 
and  Cresson,  and  by  Miss  Babbitt,  are  all  on  exhibition  at  the 
Peabody  Museum  in  Cambridge,  whither  it  is  necessary  to  go  if 
one  would  get  a comprehensive  view  of  the  relics  of  interglacial 
man  in  North  America.  The  collection  of  implements  made  by 
Dr.  Abbott  includes  much  mere  than  the  palseoliths  already  re- 
ferred to.  It  is  one  of  the  most  important  collections  in  the 
world,  and  is  worth  a long  journey  to  see.  Containing  more  than 

20.000  implements,  all  found  within  a very  limited  area  in  New 
Jersey,  ‘‘as  now  arranged,  the  collection  exhibits  at  one  and  the 
same  time  the  sequence  of  peoples  and  phases  of  development  in 
the  valley  of  the  Delaware,  from  palaeolithic  man,  through  the 
intermediate  period,  to  the  recent  Indians,  and  the  relative 
numerical  proportion  of  the  many  forms  of  their  implements, 
each  in  its  time.  ...  It  is  doubtful  whether  any  similar  collec- 
tion exists  from  which  a student  can  gather  so  much  information 
at  sight  as  in  this,  where  the  natural  pebbles  from  the  gravel  be- 
gin the  series,  and  the  beautifully  chipped  points  of  chert,  jasper, 
and  quartz  terminate  it  in  one  direction,  and  the  polished  celts 
and  grooved  stone  axes  in  the  other.”  There  are  three  principal 
groups,  — first,  the  interglacial  palaeoliths,  secondly,  the  argillite 
points  and  flakes,  and  thirdly,  the  arrow-heads,  knives,  mortars 
and  pestles,  axes  and  hoes,  ornamental  stones,  etc.,  of  Indians  of 
the  recent  period.  Dr.  Abbott’s  Primitive  Industry , published  in 
1881,  is  a useful  manual  for  studying  this  collection ; and  an  ac- 
count of  his  discoveries  in  the  glacial  gravels  is  given  in  Reports 
of  the  Peabody  Museum , vol.  ii.  pp.  30-48,  225-258  ,*  see  also  vol. 
iii.  p.  492.  A succinct  and  judicious  account  of  the  whole  subject 
is  given  by  H.  W.  Haynes,  “ The  Prehistoric  Archaeology  of 
North  America,”  in  Winsor’s  Narrative  and  Critical  History , 
vol.  i.  pp.  329-368. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


11 


But  according  to  Professor  Josiah  Whitney 
there  is  reason  for  supposing  that  man  existed  in 
California  at  a still  more  remote  period.  The  Calaveraa 
He  holds  that  the  famous  skull  dis-  8kuU* 
covered  in  1866,  in  the  gold-hearing  gravels  of 
Calaveras  county,  belongs  to  the  Pliocene  age.1 
If  this  be  so,  it  seems  to  suggest  an  antiquity  not 
less  than  twice  as  great  as  that  just  mentioned. 
The  question  as  to  the  antiquity  of  the  Calaveras 
skull  is  still  hotly  disputed  among  the  foremost 
palaeontologists,  but  as  one  reads  the  arguments 
one  cannot  help  feeling  that  theoretical  difficulties 
have  put  the  objectors  into  a somewhat  inhospit- 
able attitude  toward  the  evidence  so  ably  pre- 
sented by  Professor  Whitney.  It  has  been  too 
hastily  assumed  that,  from  the  point  of  view  of 
evolution,  the  existence  of  Pliocene  man  is  im- 
probable. Upon  general  considerations,  however, 
we  have  strong  reason  for  believing  that  human 
beings  must  have  inhabited  some  portions  of  the 
earth  throughout  the  whole  duration  of  the  Plio- 
cene period,  and  it  need  not  surprise  us  if  their 
remains  are  presently  discovered  in  more  places 
than  one.2 

1 J.  D.  Whitney,  “The  Auriferous  Gravels  of  the  Sierra  Ne- 
vada,” Memoirs  of  the  Museum  of  Comparative  Zoology  at  Har- 
vard College , Cambridge,  1880,  vol.  vi. 

2 In  an  essay  published  in  1882  on  “ Europe  before  the  Arrival 
of  Man”  {Excursions  of  an  Evolutionist , pp.  1-40),  I argued  that 
if  we  are  to  find  traces  of  the  “missing  link,”  or  primordial 
stock  of  primates  from  which  man  has  been  derived,  we  must 
undoubtedly  look  for  it  in  the  Miocene  (p.  36).  I am  pleased 
at  finding  the  same  opinion  lately  expressed  by  one  of  the  highest 
living  authorities.  The  case  is  thus  stated  by  Alfred  Russel  Wal- 
lace : “ The  evidence  we  now  possess  of  the  exact  nature  of  the 


12 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


Whatever  may  be  the  final  outcome  of  the  Ca- 
laveras controversy,  there  can  be  no  doubt  as  to 
the  existence  of  man  in  North  America  far  back 
in  early  Pleistocene  times.  The  men  of  the  River- 
drift,  who  long  dwelt  in  western  Europe  during 

resemblance  of  man  to  the  various  species  of  anthropoid  apes, 
shows  us  that  he  has  little  special  affinity  for  any  one  rather  than 
another  species,  while  he  differs  from  them  all  in  several  impor- 
tant characters  in  which  they  agree  with  each  other.  The  con- 
clusion to  be  drawn  from  these  facts  is,  that  his  points  of  affinity 
connect  him  with  the  whole  group,  while  his  special  peculiarities 
equally  separate  him  from  the  whole  group,  and  that  he  must, 
therefore,  have  diverged  from  the  common  ancestral  form  before 
the  existing  types  of  anthropoid  apes  had  diverged  from  each 
other.  Now  this  divergence  almost  certainly  took  place  as  early 
as  the  Miocene  period,  because  in  the  Upper  Miocene  deposits  of 
western  Europe  remains  of  two  species  of  ape  have  been  found 
allied  to  the  gibbons,  one  of  them,  dryopithecus,  nearly  as  large 
as  a man,  and  believed  by  M.  Lartet  to  have  approached  man 
in  its  dentition  more  than  the  existing  apes.  We  seem  hardly, 
therefore,  to  have  reached  in  the  Upper  Miocene  the  epoch  of  the 
common  ancestor  of  man  and  the  anthropoids.”  ( Darwinism , p. 
455,  London,  1889.)  Mr.  Wallace  goes  on  to  answer  the  objec- 
tion of  Professor  Boyd  Dawkins,  “that  man  did  not  probably 
exist  in  Pliocene  times,  because  almost  all  the  known  mammalia 
of  that  epoch  are  distinct  species  from  those  now  living  on  the 
earth,  and  that  the  same  changes  of  the  environment  which  led 
to  the  modification  of  other  mammalian  species  would  also  have 
led  to  a change  in  man.”  This  argument,  at  first  sight  apparently 
formidable,  quite  overlooks  the  fact  that  in  the  evolution  of  man 
there  came  a point  after  which  variations  in  his  intelligence  were 
seized  upon  more  and  more  exclusively  by  natural  selection,  to 
the  comparative  neglect  of  physical  variations.  After  that  point 
man  changed  but  little  in  physical  characteristics,  except  in  size 
and  complexity  of  brain.  This  is  the  theorem  first  propounded 
by  Mr.  Wallace  in  the  Anthropological  Review , May,  1864 ; re- 
stated in  his  Contributions  to  Natural  Selection , chap,  ix.,  in  1870 ; 
and  further  extended  and  developed  by  me  in  connection  with  the 
theory  of  man’s  origin  first  suggested  in  my  lectures  at  Harvard 
in  1871,  and  worked  out  in  Cosmic  Philosophy , part  ii.,  chapters 

X Vl.,  XXl*j  XX11» 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


13 


the  milder  intervals  of  the  Glacial  period,  but 
seem  to  have  become  extinct  toward  the  end  of  it, 
are  well  known  to  palaeontologists  through  their 
bones  and  their  rude  tools.  Contemporaneously 
with  these  Europeans  of  the  River-drift  there  cer- 
tainly lived  some  kind  of  men,  of  a similar  low 
grade  of  culture,  in  the  Mississippi  valley  and  on 
both  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  slopes  of 

. . . _ _ Pleistocene 

.North  America.  Along;  with  these  an-  men  and  mam- 

° . ro^la. 

cient  Americans  lived  some  terrestrial 
mammals  that  still  survive,  such  as  the  elk,  rein- 
deer, prairie  wolf,  bison,  musk-ox,  and  beaver; 
and  many  that  have  long  been  extinct,  such  as  the 
mylodon,  megatherium,  megalonyx,  mastodon,  Si- 
berian elephant,  mammoth,  at  least  six  or  seven 
species  of  ancestral  horse,  a huge  bear  similar  to 
the  cave  bear  of  ancient  Europe,  a lion  similar  to 
the  European  cave  lion,  and  a tiger  as  large  as 
the  modern  tiger  of  Bengal. 

Now  while  the  general  relative  positions  of  those 
stupendous  abysses  that  hold  the  oceans  do  not 
appear  to  have  undergone  any  considerable  change 
since  an  extremely  remote  geological  period,  their 
shallow  marginal  portions  have  been  repeatedly 
raised  so  as  to  add  extensive  territories  to  the  edges 
of  continents,  and  in  some  cases  to  convert  archi- 
pelagoes into  continents,  and  to  join  continents 
previously  separated.  Such  elevation  is  followed 
in  turn  by  an  era  of  subsidence,  and  almost  every, 
where  either  the  one  process  or  the  other  is  slowly 
going  on.  If  you  look  at  a model  in  relief  of  the 
continents  and  ocean-floors,  such  as  may  be  seen  at 
the  Museum  of  Comparative  Zoology  in  Cambridge, 


14  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

showing  the  results  of  a vast  number  of  soundings 
Elevation  and  in  a^  Pai>ls  of  the  world,  you  cannot  fail 
subsidence.  to  be  struck  with  the  shallowness  of 
Bering  Sea ; it  looks  like  a part  of  the  continent 
rather  than  of  the  ocean,  and  indeed  it  is  just  that, 
— an  area  of  submerged  continent.  So  in  the 
northern  Atlantic  there  is  a lofty  ridge  running 
from  France  to  Greenland.  The  British  islands, 
the  Orkney,  Shetland,  and  Faeroe  groups,  and  Ice- 
land are  the  parts  of  this  ridge  high  enough  to  re- 
main out  of  water.  The  remainder  of  it  is  shallow 
sea.  Again  and  again  it  has  been  raised,  together 
with  the  floor  of  the  German  ocean,  so  as  to  be- 
come dry  land.  Both  before  and  since  the  time 
when  those  stone  tools  were  dropped  into  the  red 
gravel  from  which  Mr.  Cresson  took  them  the  other 
day,  the  northwestern  part  of  Europe  has  been 
solid  continent  for  more  than  a hundred  miles  to 
the  west  of  the  French  and  Irish  coasts,  the  Thames 
and  Humber  have  been  tributaries  to  the  Rhine, 
which  emptied  into  the  Arctic  ocean,  and  across 
the  Atlantic  ridge  one  might  have  walked  to  the 
New  World  dryshod.1  In  similar  wise  the  north- 
western corner  of  America  has  repeatedly  been 
joined  to  Siberia  through  the  elevation  of  Bering 
Sea. 

There  have  therefore  been  abundant  opportunities 
for  men  to  get  into  America  from  the  Old  World 
without  crossing  salt  water.  Probably  this  was 
the  case  with  the  ancient  inhabitants  of  the  Dela- 
ware and  Little  Miami  valleys;  it  is  not  at  all 

1 See,  for  example,  the  map  of  Europe  in  early  post-glacial 
times,  in  James  Geikie’s  Prehistoric  Europe. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA . 15 

likely  that  men  who  used  their  kind  of  tools  knew 
much  about  going  on  the  sea  in  boats. 

Whether  the  Indians  are  descended  from  this 
ancient  population  or  not,  is  a question  with  which 
we  have  as  yet  no  satisfactory  method  of  dealing. 
It  is  not  unlikely  that  these  glacial  men  may  have 
perished  from  off  the  face  of  the  earth,  having  been 
crushed  and  supplanted  by  stronger  races.  There 
may  have  been  several  successive  waves  Waves  of  ^ 
of  migration,  of  which  the  Indians  were  gratior1, 
the  latest.1  There  is  time  enough  for  a great 
many  things  to  happen  in  a thousand  centuries. 
It  will  doubtless  be  long  before  all  the  evidence 
can  be  brought  in  and  ransacked,  but  of  one  thing 
we  may  feel  pretty  sure ; the  past  is  more  full  of 
changes  than  we  are  apt  to  realize.  Our  first 
theories  are  usually  too  simple,  and  have  to  be  en- 
larged and  twisted  into  all  manner  of  shapes  in 
order  to  cover  the  actual  complication  of  facts.2 

1 “ There  are  three  human  crania  in  the  Museum,  which  were 
found  in  the  gravel  at  Trenton,  one  several  feet  below  the  surface, 
the  others  near  the  surface.  These  skulls,  which  are  of  remark- 
able uniformity,  are  of  small  size  and  of  oval  shape,  differing  from 
all  other  skulls  in  the  Museum.  In  fact  they  are  of  a distinct 
type,  and  hence  of  the  greatest  importance.  So  far  as  they  go 
they  indicate  that  palaeolithic  man  was  exterminated,  or  has  be- 
come lost  by  admixture  with  others  during  the  many  thousand 
years  which  have  passed  since  he  inhabited  the  Delaware  valley.” 
F.  W.  Putnam,  “ The  Peabody  Museum,”  Proceedings  of  the 
American  Antiquarian  Society , 1889,  New  Series,  vol.  vi.  p.  189. 

2 An  excellent  example  of  this  is  the  expansion  and  modifica- 
tion undergone  during  the  past  twenty  years  by  our  theories  of 
the  Aryan  settlement  of  Europe.  See  Benfey’s  preface  to  Fick’s 
Woerterbuch  der  Indogermanischen  Grundsprache,  1868 ; Geiger, 
Zur  EntwicJcelungsgeschichte  der  Menschheit,  1871 ; Cuno,  For- 
schungen  im  Gebiete  der  alten  Voellcerkunde,  1871 ; Schmidt,  Die 
Verwandtschaftsverhaltnisse  der  Indogermanischen  Sprachen,  1872; 


16 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


In  this  connection  the  history  of  the  Eskimos 
introduces  us  to  some  interesting  problems.  Men- 
tion has  been  made  of  the  River-drift  men  who 
lived  in  Europe  during  the  milder  intervals  of  the 
Glacial  period.  At  such  times  they  made  their 
way  into  Germany  and  Britain,  along  with  leopards, 
hyaenas,  and  African  elephants.  But  as  the  cold 
intervals  came  on  and  the  edge  of  the  polar  ice- 
sheet  crept  southward  and  mountain  glaciers  filled 
up  the  valleys,  these  men  and  beasts  retreated 
into  Africa ; and  their  place  was  taken  by  a sub- 
The  cave  men  arctic  race  of  men  known  as  the  Cave 
theEGiaciaim  men,  along  with  the  reindeer  and  arctic 
Period.  fQX  anc[  musk-sheep.  More  than  once 
with  the  secular  alternations  of  temperature  did 
the  River-drift  men  thus  advance  and  retreat  and 
advance  again,  and  as  they  advanced  the  Cave  men 
retreated,  both  races  yielding  to  an  enemy  stronger 
than  either,  — to  wit,  the  hostile  climate.  At 
length  all  traces  of  the  River-drift  men  vanish,  but 
what  of  the  Cave  men  ? They  have  left  no  repre- 
sentatives among  the  present  populations  of  Europe, 
but  the  musk-sheep,  which  always  went  and  came 
with  the  Cave  men,  is  to-day  found  only  in  sub- 


Poesehe,  Die  Arier,  1878 ; Lindenschmit,  Handbuch  der  deutschen 
Alterthumskunde , 1880;  Penka,  Origines  Ariacce,  1883,  and  Die 
HerJcunft  der  Arier,  1886 ; Spiegel,  Die  arische  Periode  und  ihre 
Zustande,  1887 ; Rendal,  Cradle  of  the  Aryans , 1889 ; Schrader, 
Sprachvergleichung  und  Urgeschichte,  1883,  and  second  edition 
translated  into  English,  with  the  title  Prehistoric  Antiquities  of 
the  Aryan  Peoples , 1890.  Schrader’s  is  an  epoch-making  book. 
An  attempt  to  defend  the  older  and  simpler  views  is  made  by 
Max  Miiller,  Biographies  of  Words  and  the  Home  of  the  Aryas, 
1888 ; see  also  Van  den  Gheyn,  Horigine  europeenne  des  Aryas , 
1889.  The  whole  case  is  well  summed  up  by  Isaac  Taylor, 
Origin  of  the  Aryans , 1889. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


17 


arctic  America  among  the  Eskimos,  and  the  fos- 
silized bones  of  the  musk-sheep  lie  in  a regular  trail 
across  the  eastern  hemisphere,  from  the  Pyrenees 
through  Germany  and  Russia  and  all  the  vast 
length  of  Siberia.  The  stone  arrow-heads,  the 
sewing-needles,  the  necklaces  and  amulets  of  cut 
teeth,  and  the  daggers  made  from  antler,  used  by 
the  Eskimos,  resemble  so  minutely  the  implements 
of  the  Cave  men,  that  if  recent  Eskimo  remains 
were  to  be  put  into  the  Pleistocene  caves  of  France 
and  England  they  would  be  indistinguishable  in 
appearance  from  the  remains  of  the  Cave  men 
which  are  now  found  there.1  There  is  another 
striking  point  of  resemblance.  The  Eskimos  have 
a talent  for  artistic  sketching  of  men  and  beasts, 
and  scenes  in  which  men  and  beasts  figure,  which 
is  absolutely  unrivalled  among  rude  peoples.  One 
need  but  look  at  the  sketches  by  common  Eskimo 
fishermen  which  illustrate  Dr.  Henry  Rink’s  fas- 
cinating book  on  Danish  Greenland,  to  realize  that 
this  rude  Eskimo  art  has  a character  as  pronounced 
and  unmistakable  in  its  way  as  the  much  higher  art 
of  the  J apanese.  Now  among  the  European  remains 
of  the  Cave  men  are  many  sketches  of  mammoths, 
cave  bears,  and  other  animals  now  extinct,  and 
hunting  scenes  so  artfully  and  vividly  portrayed 
as  to  bring  distinctly  before  us  many  details  of 
daily  life  in  an  antiquity  so  vast  that  in  comparison 
with  it  the  interval  between  the  pyramids  ^ Eskim08 
of  Egypt  and  the  Eiffel  tower  shrinks  ^remn^tS 
into  a point.  Such  a talent  is  unique  theCavemen* 
among  savage  peoples.  It  exists  only  among  the 
living  Eskimos  and  the  ancient  Cave  men;  and 
1 See  Dawkins,  Early  Man  in  Britain , pp.  233-245. 


18 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


when  considered  in  connection  with  so  many  other 
points  of  agreement,  and  with  the  indisputable  fact 
that  the  Cave  men  were  a sub-arctic  race,  it  affords 
a strong  presumption  in  favour  of  the  opinion  of 
that  great  palaeontologist,  Professor  Boyd  Daw- 
kins, that  the  Eskimos  of  North  America  are  to- 
day the  sole  survivors  of  the  race  that  made  their 
homes  in  the  Pleistocene  caves  of  western  Europe.1 

1 According  to  Dr.  Rink  the  Eskimos  formerly  inhabited  the 
central  portions  of  North  America,  and  have  retreated  or  been 
driven  northward;  he  would  make  the  Eskimos  of  Siberia  an 
offshoot  from  those  of  America,  though  he  freely  admits  that 
there  are  grounds  for  entertaining  the  opposite  view.  Dr.  Abbott 
is  inclined  to  attribute  an  Eskimo  origin  to  some  of  the  palseo- 
liths  of  the  Trenton  gravel.  On  the  other  hand,  Mr.  Clements 
Markham  derives  the  American  Eskimos  from  those  of  Siberia. 
It  seems  to  me  that  these  views  may  he  comprehended  and 
reconciled  in  a wider  one.  I would  suggest  that  during  the 
Glacial  period  the  ancestral  Eskimos  may  have  gradually  be- 
come adapted  to  arctic  conditions  of  life  ; that  in  the  mild  inter- 
glacial intervals  they  migrated  northward  along  with  the  musk- 
sheep  ; and  that  upon  the  return  of  the  cold  they  migrated  south- 
ward again,  keeping  always  near  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet. 
Such  a southward  migration  would  naturally  enough  bring  them 
in  one  continent  down  to  the  Pyrenees,  in  the  other  down  to  the 
Alleghanies ; and  naturally  enough  the  modern  inquirer  has  his 
attention  first  directed  to  the  indications  of  their  final  retreat, 
both  northward  in  America  and  northeastward  from  Europe 
through  Siberia.  This  is  like  what  happened  with  so  many 
plants  and  animals.  Compare  Darwin’s  remarks  on  “ Dispersal 
in  the  Glacial  Period,”  Origin  of  Species , chap.  xii. 

The  best  books  on  the  Eskimos  are  those  of  Dr.  Rink,  Tales 
and  Traditions  of  the  Eskimo , Edinburgh,  1875 ; Danish  Greenland , 
London,  1877 ; The  Eskimo  Tribes , their  Distribution  and  Charac- 
teristics, especially  in  regard  to  Language , Copenhagen,  1887.  See 
also  Franz  Boas,  “The  Central  Eskimo,”  Sixth  Report  of  the 
Bureau  of  Ethnology,  Washington,  1888,  pp.  399-669  ; W.  H.  Dali, 
Alaska  and  its  Resources , 1870 ; Markham,  “ Origin  and  Migra- 
tions of  the  Greenland  Esquimaux,”  Journal  of  the  Royal  Geo- 
graphical Society , 1865 ; Cranz,  Historic  von  Groenland,  Leipsic, 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


19 


If  we  have  always  been  accustomed  to  think  of 
races  of  men  only  as  they  are  placed  on  modem 
maps,  it  at  first  seems  strange  to  think  of  England 
and  France  as  ever  having  been  inhabited  by  Es- 
kimos. Facts  equally  strange  may  be  cited  in 
abundance  from  zoology  and  botany.  The  camel 
is  found  to-day  only  in  Arabia  and  Bactria ; yet 
in  all  probability  the  camel  originated  in  Amer- 
ica,1 and  is  an  intruder  into  what  we  are  accus- 
tomed to  call  his  native  deserts,  just  as  the  people 
of  the  United  States  are  European  intruders  upon 
the  soil  of  America.  So  the  giant  trees  of  Mari- 
posa grove  are  now  found  only  in  California,  but 
there  was  once  a time  when  they  were  as  common 
in  Europe 2 as  maple-trees  to-day  in  a New  Eng- 
land village. 

Familiarity  with  innumerable  facts  of  this  sort, 
concerning  the  complicated  migrations  and  distri- 
bution of  plants  and  animals,  has  entirely  altered 
our  way  of  looking  at  the  question  as  to  the  origin 
of  the  American  Indians.  As  already  observed, 
we  can  hardly  be  said  to  possess  sufficient  data  for 
determining  whether  they  are  descended  from  the 
Pleistocene  inhabitants  of  America,  or  have  come 
in  some  later  wave  of  migration  from  the  Old 
World.  Nor  can  we  as  yet  determine  whether 

1765  ; Petitot,  Traditions  indiennes  du  Canada  nord-ouest , Faris, 
1886  ; Pilling’s  Bibliography  of  the  Eskimo  Language , Washington, 
1887 ; Wells  and  Kelly,  English-Eskimo  and  Eskimo-English  Vo- 
cabularies, with  Ethnographical  Memoranda  concerning  the  Arctic 
Eskimos  in  Alaska  and  Siberia,  Washington,  1890 ; Carstensen  s 
Two  Summers  in  Greenland , London,  1890. 

1 Wallace,  Geographical  Distribution  of  Animals,  vol.  ii.  p.  155. 

2 Asa  Gray,  “ Sequoia  and  its  History,”  in  his  Danoiniana, 
pp.  205-235. 


20 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


they  were  earlier  or  later  comers  than  the  Eskimos. 
But  since  we  have  got  rid  of  that  feeling  of  specu- 
lative necessity  above  referred  to,  for  bringing  the 
red  men  from  Asia  within  the  historic  period,  it  has 
become  more  and  more  clear  that  they  have  dwelt 
upon  American  soil  for  a very  long  time.  The 
aboriginal  American,  as  we  know  him,  with  his 
language  and  legends,  his  physical  and  mental 
peculiarities,  his  social  observances  and  customs,  is 
most  emphatically  a native  and  not  an  imported 
article.  He  belongs  to  the  American  continent  as 
strictly  as  its  opossums  and  armadillos,  its  maize 
and  its  golden-rod,  or  any  members  of  its  aborigi- 
There  was  nal  ^auna  an^  h°ra  belong  to  it.  In  all 
connectfon°or  probability  he  came  from  the  Old  World 
water  between  at  some  ancient  period,  whether  pre- 
ica’and  tiT*'  glacial  or  post-glacial,  when  it  was  pos- 
oid world.  sib>le  to  come  by  land;  and  here  in  all 
probability,  until  the  arrival  of  white  men  from 
Europe,  he  remained  undisturbed  by  later  comers, 
unless  the  Eskimos  may  have  been  such.  There  is 
not  a particle  of  evidence  to  suggest  any  connection 
or  intercourse  between  aboriginal  America  and 
Asia  within  any  such  period  as  the  last  twenty 
thousand  years,  except  in  so  far  as  there  may  per- 
haps now  and  then  have  been  slight  surges  of 
Eskimo  tribes  back  and  forth  across  Bering  strait. 

The  Indians  must  surely  be  regarded  as  an  en- 
tirely different  stock  from  the  Eskimos.  On  the 
other  hand,  the  most  competent  American  ethnol- 
ogists are  now  pretty  thoroughly  agreed  that  all 
the  aborigines  south  of  the  Eskimo  region,  all  the 
way  from  Hudson’s  Bay  to  Cape  Horn,  belong 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


21 


to  one  and  the  same  race.  It  was  formerly  sup- 
posed that  the  higher  culture  of  the  Aztecs,  Mayas, 
and  Peruvians  must  indicate  that  they  were  of 
different  race  from  the  more  barbarous  Algonquins 
and  Dakotas ; and  a speculative  necessity  was  felt 
for  proving  that,  whatever  may  have  been  the  case 
with  the  other  American  peoples,  this  ig  one 
higher  culture  at  any  rate  must  have 
been  introduced  within  the  historic  race* 
period  from  the  Old  World.1  This  feeling  was 
caused  partly  by  the  fact  that,  owing  to  crude 
and  loosely-framed  conceptions  of  the  real  points 
of  difference  between  civilization  and  barbarism, 
this  Central  American  culture  was  absurdly  exag- 
gerated. As  the  further  study  of  the  uncivilized 
parts  of  the  world  has  led  to  more  accurate  and 
precise  conceptions,  this  kind  of  speculative  neces- 
sity has  ceased  to  be  felt.  There  is  an  increasing 
disposition  among  scholars  to  agree  that  the  war- 
rior of  Anahuac  and  the  shepherd  of  the  Andes 
were  just  simply  Indians,  and  that  their  culture 
was  no  less  indigenous  than  that  of  the  Cherokees 
or  Mohawks. 

To  prevent  any  possible  misconception  of  my 
meaning,  a further  word  of  explanation  may  be 
needed  at  this  point.  The  word  “ race  _ 

• . ? . Different 

is  used  in  such  widely  different  senses  senses  in  which 

. J the  word 

that  there  is  apt  to  be  more  or  less  “ “ 

A # # used* 

vagueness  about  it.  The  difference  is 

1 Illustrations  may  be  found  in  plenty  in  the  learned  works  of 
Brasseur  de  Bourbourg : — Histoire  des  nations  civilizes  du  Mtxique 
et  de  V Ambrique  centrale,  4 vols.,  Paris,  1857-58;  Popol  Vuh , 
Paris,  1861 ; Quatre  lettres  sur  le  Mtxique,  Paris,  1868 ; Le  manu~ 
scrit  Troano , Paris,  1870,  etc. 


22 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


mainly  in  what  logicians  call  extension ; some- 
times the  word  covers  very  little  ground,  some- 
times a great  deal.  We  say  that  the  people  of  Eng- 
land, of  the  United  States,  and  of  New  South 
Wales  belong  to  one  and  the  same  race ; and  we 
say  that  an  Englishman,  a Frenchman,  and  a 
Greek  belong  to  three  different  races.  There  is 
a sense  in  which  both  these  statements  are  true. 
But  there  is  also  a sense  in  which  we  may  say 
that  the  Englishman,  the  Frenchman,  and  the 
Greek  belong  to  one  and  the  same  race  ; and  that 
is  when  we  are  contrasting  them  as  white  men 
with  black  men  or  yellow  men.  Now  we  may 
correctly  say  that  a Shawnee,  an  Ojibwa,  and  a 
Kickapoo  belong  to  one  and  the  same  Algonquin 
race ; that  a Mohawk  and  a Tuscarora  belong  to 
one  and  the  same  Iroquois  race ; but  that  an  Al- 
gonquin differs  from  an  Iroquois  somewhat  as  an 
Englishman  differs  from  a Frenchman.  No  doubt 
we  may  fairly  say  that  the  Mexicans  encountered 
by  Cortes  differed  in  race  from  the  Iroquois  en- 
countered by  Champlain,  as  much  as  an  English- 
man differs  from  an  Albanian  or  a Montenegrin. 
But  when  we  are  contrasting  aboriginal  Ameri- 
cans with  white  men  or  yellow  men,  it  is  right  to 
say  that  Mexicans  and  Iroquois  belong  to  the 
same  great  red  race. 

In  some  parts  of  the  world  two  strongly  con- 
trasted races  have  become  mingled  together,  or 
have  existed  side  by  side  for  centuries  without  in- 
termingling. In  Europe  the  big  blonde  Aryan- 
speaking race  has  mixed  with  the  small  brunette 
Iberian  race,  producing  the  endless  varieties  in 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


23 


stature  and  complexion  winch  may  be  seen  in  any 
drawing-room  in  London  or  New  York.  In  Africa 
south  of  Sahara,  on  the  other  hand,  we  find,  inter- 
spersed among  negro  tribes  but  kept  perfectly  dis- 
tinct, that  primitive  dwarfish  race  with  yellow  skin 
and  tufted  hair  to  which  belong  the  Hottentots  and 
Bushmen,  the  Wambatti  lately  discovered  by  Mr. 
Stanley,  and  other  tribes.1  Now  in  America  south 
of  Hudson’s  Bay  the  case  seems  to  have  been  quite 
otherwise,  and  more  as  it  would  have  been  in  Eu- 
rope if  there  had  been  only  Aryans,  or  in  Africa 
if  there  had  been  only  blacks.2 

The  belief  that  the  people  of  the  Cordilleras 
must  be  of  radically  different  race  from  other 
Indians  was  based  upon  the  vague  notion  that 
grades  of  culture  have  some  necessary  connection 
with  likenesses  and  differences  of  race. 

There  is  no  such  necessary  connection.3  connection  be- 

_ _ tween  differ- 

Between  the  highly  civilized  Japanese  encea  in 

ii*i  i ° J * . culture  and 

and  their  barbarous  Mandshu  cousms  differences 

in  race. 

the  difference  in  culture  is  much  greater 

1 See  Werner,  “The  African  Pygmies,”  Popular  Science 
Monthly , September,  1890,  — a thoughtful  and  interesting  article. 

2 This  sort  of  illustration  requires  continual  limitation  and 
qualification.  The  case  in  ancient  America  was  not  quite  as  it 
would  have  been  in  Europe  if  there  had  been  only  Aryans  there. 
The  semi-civilized  people  of  the  Cordilleras  were  relatively  bra- 
chycephalous  as  compared  with  the  more  barbarous  Indians  north 
and  east  of  New  Mexico.  It  is  correct  to  call  this  a distinction 
of  race  if  we  mean  thereby  a distinction  developed  upon  Ameri- 
can soil,  a differentiation  within  the  limits  of  the  red  race,  and 
not  an  intrusion  from  without.  In  this  sense  the  Caribs  also  may 
he  regarded  as  a distinct  sub-race ; and,  in  the  same  sense,  we 
may  call  the  Kafirs  a distinct  sub-race  of  African  blacks.  See, 
as  to  the  latter,  Tylor,  Anthropology , p.  39. 

8 As  Sir  John  Lubbock  well  says,  “ Different  races  in  similar 


24 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


than  the  difference  between  Mohawks  and  Mex- 
icans ; and  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  people 
of  Israel  and  Judah  in  contrast  with  the  Arabs 
of  the  desert,  or  of  the  imperial  Romans  in  com- 
parison with  their  Teutonic  kinsmen  as  described 
by  Tacitus. 

At  this  point,  in  order  to  prepare  ourselves  the 
more  clearly  to  understand  sundry  facts  with 
which  we  shall  hereafter  be  obliged  to  deal,  espe- 
cially the  wonderful  experiences  of  the  Spanish  con- 
querors, it  will  be  well  to  pause  for  a moment  and 
do  something  toward  defining  the  different  grades 
Grades  of  cui-  of  culture  through  which  men  have 
ture*  passed  in  attaining  to  the  grade  which 

can  properly  be  called  civilization.  Unless  we 
begin  with  clear  ideas  upon  this  head  we  cannot 
go  far  toward  understanding  the  ancient  America 
that  was  first  visited  and  described  for  us  by 
Spaniards.  The  various  grades  of  culture  need 
to  be  classified,  and  that  most  original  and  sugges- 
tive scholar,  the  late  Lewis  Morgan  of  Rochester, 
made  a brilliant  attempt  in  this  direction,  to  which 
the  reader’s  attention  is  now  invited. 

Below  Civilization  Mr.  Morgan1  distinguishes 
two  principal  grades  or  stages  of  culture,  namely 
Savagery  and  Barbarism . There  is  much  loose- 
ness and  confusion  in  the  popular  use  of  these 

stages  of  development  often  present  more  features  of  resemblance 
to  one  another  than  the  same  race  does  to  itself  in  different  stages 
of  its  history.”  ( Origin  of  Civilization , p.  11.)  If  every  student  of 
history  and  ethnology  would  begin  by  learning  this  lesson,  the 
world  would  be  spared  a vast  amount  of  unprofitable  theorizing. 

1 See  his  great  work  on  Ancient  Society , New  York,  1877. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


25 


terms,  and  this  is  liable  to  become  a fruitful 
source  of  misapprehension  in  the  case  of  any 
statement  involving  either  of  them.  When  popu- 
lar usage  discriminates  between  them  extinction  b©. 
it  discriminates  in  the  right  direction  ; 
there  is  a vague  but  not  uncertain  feel-  Barbarijnn- 
ing  that  savagery  is  a lower  stage  than  barbarism. 
But  ordinarily  the  discrimination  is  not  made  and 
the  two  terms  are  carelessly  employed  as  if  inter- 
changeable. Scientific  writers  long  since  recog- 
nized a general  difference  between  savagery  and 
barbarism,  but  Mr.  Morgan  was  the  first  to  sug- 
gest a really  useful  criterion  for  distinguishing 
between  them.  His  criterion  is  the  making  of 
pottery ; and  his  reason  for  selecting  it  is  that  the 
making  of  pottery  is  something  that  presupposes 
village  life  and  more  or  less  progress  in  the  simpler 
arts.  The  earlier  methods  of  boiling  food  were 
either  putting  it  into  holes  in  the  ground  lined 
with  skins  and  then  using  heated  stones,  or  else 
putting  it  into  baskets  coated  with  clay  0rigin  of  ^ 
to  be  supported  over  a fire.  The  clay  teiy‘ 
served  the  double  purpose  of  preventing  liquids 
from  escaping  and  protecting  the  basket  against 
the  flame.  It  was  probably  observed  that  the  clay 
was  hardened  by  the  fire,  and  thus  in  course  of 
time  it  was  found  that  the  clay  would  answer  the 
purpose  without  the  basket.1  Whoever  first  made 
this  ingenious  discovery  led  the  way  from  sav- 
agery to  barbarism.  Throughout  the  present  work 

1 See  the  evidence  in  Tylor,  Researches  into  the  Early  History 
of  Mankind , pp.  269-272 ; cf . Lubbock,  Prehistoric  Times , p.  573 ; 
and  see  Cushing’s  masterly  “Study  of  Pueblo  Pottery,”  etc., 
Reports  of  Bureau  of  Ethnology , iv.,  473-521. 


26 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


we  shall  apply  the  name  “savages”  only  to  un- 
civilized people  who  do  not  make  pottery. 

But  within  each  of  these  two  stages  Mr.  Mor- 
gan distinguishes  three  subordinate  stages,  or 
Ethnic  Periods,  which  may  be  called  either  lower, 
middle,  and  upper  status,  or  older,  middle,  and 
later  periods.  The  lower  status  of  savagery  was 
Lower  status  f wholly  prehistoric  stage  when  men 
of  savagery.  iive(t  in  their  original  restricted  habitat 
and  subsisted  on  fruit  and  nuts.  To  this  period 
must  be  assigned  the  beginning  of  articulate 
speech.  All  existing  races  of  men  had  passed  be- 
yond it  at  an  unknown  antiquity. 

Men  began  to  pass  beyond  it  when  they  dis- 
covered how  to  catch  fish  and  how  to  use  fire. 
They  could  then  begin  (following  coasts  and 
Middle  status  rivers)  to  spread  over  the  earth.  The 
of  savagery,  middle  status  of  savagery,  thus  intro- 
duced, ends  with  the  invention  of  that  compound 
weapon,  the  bow  and  arrow.  The  natives  of  Aus- 
tralia, who  do  not  know  this  weapon,  are  still  in 
the  middle  status  of  savagery.1 

The  invention  of  the  bow  and  arrow,  which 
marks  the  upper  status  of  savagery,  was  not  only 
a great  advance  in  military  art,  but  it  also  vastly 
Upper  status  increased  men’s  supply  of  food  by  in- 
of  savagery.  creasing  their  power  of  killing  wild 
game.  The  lowest  tribes  in  America,  such  as 
those  upon  the  Columbia  river,  the  Athabaskans 
of  Hudson’s  Bay,  the  Fuegians  and  some  other 
South  American  tribes,  are  in  the  upper  status  of 
savagery. 

1 Lumholtz,  Among  Cannibals , London,  1889,  gives  a vivid  pic- 
ture of  aboriginal  life  in  Australia. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


27 


The  transition  from  this  status  to  the  lower 
status  of  barbarism  was  marked,  as  before 
observed,  by  the  invention  of  pottery.  The  end 
of  the  lower  status  of  barbarism  was  marked  in 
the  Old  World  by  the  domestication  of  animals 
other  than  the  dog,  which  was  probably  domesti- 
cated a i a much  earlier  period  as  an  aid  to  the 
hunter.  The  domestication  of  horses  and  asses, 
oxen  and  sheep,  goats  and  pigs,  marks  Lower 
of  course  an  immense  advance.  Along 
with  it  goes  considerable  development  eml”  th0 
of  agriculture,  thus  enabling  a small  iJ5phere*' 
territory  to  support  many  people.  It  takes  a 
wide  range  of  country  to  support  hunters.  In 
the  New  World,  except  in  Peru,  the  only  do- 
mesticated animal  was  the  dog.  Horses,  oxen, 
and  the  other  animals  mentioned  did  not  exist  in 
America,  during  the  historic  period,  until  they 
were  brought  over  from  Europe  by  the  Spaniards. 
In  ancient  American  society  there  was  no  such 
thing  as  a pastoral  stage  of  development,1  and  the 
absence  of  domesticable  animals  from  the  western 
hemisphere  may  well  be  reckoned  as  very  impor- 
tant among  the  causes  which  retarded  the  pro- 
gress of  mankind  in  this  part  of  the  world. 

On  the  other  hand  the  ancient  Americans  had 
a cereal  plant  peculiar  to  the  New  World,  which 
made  comparatively  small  demands  upon  the  in- 
telligence and  industry  of  the  cultivator.  Maize 
or  “ Indian  corn  ” has  played  a most  important 

1 The  case  of  Peru,  which  forms  an  apparent  hut  not  real  ex- 
ception to  this  general  statement,  will  be  considered  below  in 
chap.  ix. 


28 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


part  in  the  history  of  the  New  World,  as  regards 
both  the  red  men  and  the  white  men.  It  could 
be  planted  without  clearing  or  ploughing  the  soil. 
It  was  only  necessary  to  girdle  the  trees  with  a 
stone  hatchet,  so  as  to  destroy  their  leaves  and  let 
in  the  sunshine.  A few  scratches  and  digs  were 
made  in  the  ground  with  a stone  digger,  and  the 
seed  once  dropped  in  took  care  of  itself.  The  ears 

importance  of  could  hang  for  weeks  after  ripening, 
Indian  com.  an(l  e0ulcl  be  picked  off  without  med- 

dling  with  the  stalk ; there  was  no  need  of  thresh- 
ing and  winnowing.  None  of  the  Old  World  ce- 
reals can  be  cultivated  without  much  more  industry 
and  intelligence.  At  the  same  time,  when  Indian 
corn  is  sown  in  tilled  land  it  yields  with  little  la- 
bour more  than  twice  as  much  food  per  acre  as  any 
other  kind  of  grain.  This  was  of  incalculable  ad- 
vantage to  the  English  settlers  of  New  England, 
who  would  have  found  it  much  harder  to  gain  a 
secure  foothold  upon  the  soil  if  they  had  had  to 
begin  by  preparing  it  fcr  wheat  and  rye  without 
the  aid  of  the  beautiful  and  beneficent  American 
plant.1  The  Indians  of  the  Atlantic  coast  of 
North  America  for  the  most  part  lived  in  stock- 
aded villages,  and  cultivated  their  corn  along  with 
beans,  pumpkins,  squashes,  and  tobacco ; but  their 
cultivation  was  of  the  rudest  sort,2  and  population 
was  too  sparse  for  much  progress  toward  civiliza- 

1 See  Shaler,  “ Physiography  of  North  America,”  in  Winsor’s 
Narr.  and  Cric.  Hist.  vol.  iv.  p.  xiii. 

2 “ No  manure  was  used,”  says  Mr.  Parkman,  speaking  of  the 
Hurons,  but  at  intervals  of  from  ten  to  twenty  years,  when  the 
soil  was  exhausted  and  firewood  distant,  the  village  was  aban- 
doned and  a new  one  built.”  Jesuits  in  North  America,  p.  xxx. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA . 


29 


tion.  But  Indian  com,  when  sown  in  carefully 
tilled  and  irrigated  land,  had  much  to  do  with 
the  denser  population,  the  increasing  organization 
of  labour,  and  the  higher  development  in  the  arts, 
which  characterized  the  confederacies  of  Mexico 
and  Central  America  and  all  the  pueblo  Indians 
of  the  southwest.  The  potato  played  a somewhat 
similar  part  in  Peru.  Hence  it  seems  proper  to 
take  the  regular  employment  of  tillage  with  irri- 
gation as  marking  the  end  of  the  lower  period  of 
barbarism  in  the  New  World.  To  this  Mr.  Mor- 
gan adds  the  use  of  adobe-brick  and  stone  in  ar- 
chitecture, which  also  distinguished  the  Mexicans 
and  their  neighbours  from  the  ruder  tribes  of 
North  and  South  America.  All  these  ruder  tribes, 
except  the  few  already  mentioned  as  in  the  upper 
period  of  savagery,  were  somewhere  within  the 
lower  period  of  barbarism.  Thus  the  Algonquins 
and  Iroquois,  the  Creeks,  the  Dakotas,  etc.,  when 
first  seen  by  white  men,  were  within  this  period ; 
but  some  had  made  much  further  progress  within 
it  than  others.  For  example,  the  Algonquin  tribe 
of  Ojibwas  had  little  more  than  emerged  from  sav- 
agery,  while  the  Creeks  and  Cherokees  had  made 
considerable  advance  toward  the  middle  status  of 
barbarism. 

Let  us  now  observe  some  characteristics  of  this 
extremely  interesting  middle  period.  It  began, 
we  see,  in  the  eastern  hemisphere  with  status 
the  domestication  of  other  animals  than  of  barbarism- 
the  dog,  and  in  the  western  hemisphere  with  culti- 
vation by  irrigation  and  the  use  of  adobe-brick 
and  stone  for  building.  It  also  possessed  another 


BO 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


feature  which  distinguished  it  from  earlier  pe- 
riods, in  the  materials  of  which  its  tools  were 
made.  In  the  periods  of  savagery  hatchets  and 
spear-heads  were  made  of  rudely  chipped  stones. 
In  the  lower  period  of  barbarism  the  chipping  be- 
came more  and  more  skilful  until  it  gave  place  to 
polishing.  In  the  middle  period  tools  were  greatly 
multiplied,  improved  polishing  gave  sharp  and 
accurate  points  and  edges,  and  at  last  metals  be- 
gan to  be  used  as  materials  preferable  to  stone. 
In  America  the  metal  used  was  copper,  and  in 
some  spots  where  it  was  very  accessible  there  were 
instances  of  its  use  by  tribes  not  in  other  respects 
above  the  lower  status  of  barbarism,  — as  for  ex- 
ample, the  “ mound-builders.”  In  the  Old  World 
the  metal  used  was  the  alloy  of  copper  and  tin 
familiarly  known  as  bronze,  and  in  its  working  it 
called  for  a higher  degree  of  intelligence  than 
copper. 

Toward  the  close  of  the  middle  period  of  bar 
barism  the  working  of  metals  became  the  most  im- 
portant element  of  progress,  and  the  period  may  be 
working  of  regarded  as  ending  with  the  invention 
metais.  0f  the  process  of  smelting  iron  ore. 
According  to  this  principle  of  division,  the  in- 
habitants of  the  lake  villages  of  ancient  Switzer- 
land, who  kept  horses  and  oxen,  pigs  and  sheep, 
raised  wheat  and  ground  it  into  flour,  and  spun 
and  wove  linen  garments,  but  knew  nothing  of 
iron,  were  in  the  middle  status  of  barbarism.  The 
same  was  true  of  the  ancient  Britons  before  they 
learned  the  use  of  iron  from  their  neighbours  in 
Gaul.  In  the  New  World  the  representatives  of 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


31 


the  middle  status  of  barbarism  were  such  peoples 
as  the  Zufiis,  the  Aztecs,  the  Mayas,  and  the  Peru- 
vians. 

The  upper  status  of  barbarism,  in  so  far  as  it 
implies  a knowledge  of  smelting  iron,  was  never 
reached  in  aboriginal  America.  In  the  Old  World 
it  is  the  stage  which  had  been  reached  Upper  BtatuJ! 
by  the  Greeks  of  the  Homeric  poems  1 01  barbariam- 
and  the  Germans  in  the  time  of  Caesar.  The  end 

1 In  the  interesting  architectural  remains  unearthed  by  Dr. 
Schliemann  at  Mycenae  and  Tiryns,  there  have  been  found  at  the 
former  place  a few  iron  keys  and  knives,  at  the  latter  one  iron 
lance-head ; but  the  form  and  workmanship  of  these  objects 
mark  them  as  not  older  than  the  beginning  of  the  fifth  century 
b.  a,  or  the  time  of  the  Persian  wars.  With  these  exceptions 
the  weapons  and  tools  found  in  these  cities,  as  also  in  Troy,  were 
of  bronze  and  stone.  Bronze  was  in  common  use,  but  obsidian 
knives  and  arrow-heads  of  fine  workmanship  abound  in  the  ruins. 
According  to  Professor  Sayce,  these  ruins  must  date  from  2000 
to  1700  b.  c.  The  Greeks  of  that  time  would  accordingly  be 
placed  in  the  middle  status  of  barbarism.  (See  Schliemann’s 
Mycenae,  pp.  75,  364;  Tiryns,  p.  171.)  In  the  state  of  society 
described  in  the  Homeric  poems  the  smelting  of  iron  was  well 
known,  but  the  process  seems  to  have  been  costly,  so  that  bronze 
weapons  were  still  commonly  used.  (Tylor,  Anthropology , p. 
279.)  The  Romans  of  the  regal  period  were  ignorant  of  iron. 
(Lanciani,  Ancient  Rome  in  the  Light  of  Recent  Discoveries,  Bos- 
ton, 1888,  pp.  39-48.)  The  upper  period  of  barbarism  was 
shortened  for  Greece  and  Rome  through  the  circumstance  that 
they  learned  the  working  of  iron  from  Egypt  and  the  use  of  the 
alphabet  from  Phoenicia.  Such  copying,  of  course,  affects  the 
symmetry  of  such  schemes  as  Mr.  Morgan’s,  and  allowances  have 
to  be  made  for  it.  It  is  curious  that  both  Greeks  and  Romans 
seem  to  have  preserved  some  tradition  of  the  Bronze  Age  : — 

rots  S’  xaXicea.  fiev  Tev\ea,  ^aA/ccot  6e  re  oT/cot, 

^oAko>  S’  eipyd^ovTO  ’ fie'Aas  S’  ovk  etrice  triSrjpof. 

Hesiod,  Opp.  Di.  134. 


Anna  antiqua  manus  ungues  dentesque  fuerunt 
Et  lapides  et  item  sil varum  fragmina  rami, 


32 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


of  this  period  and  the  beginning  of  true  civiliza- 
tion is  marked  by  the  invention  of  a phonetic 
alphabet  and  the  production  of  written  records. 
This  brings  within  the  pale  of  civilization  such 
people  as  the  ancient  Phoenicians,  the  Hebrews 
Beginning  of  after  the  exodus,  the  ruling  classes  at 
civilization.  Nineveh  and  Babylon,  the  Aryans  of 

Persia  and  India,  and  the  Japanese.  But  clearly 
it  will  not  do  to  insist  too  narrowly  upon  the  pho- 
netic character  of  the  alphabet.  Where  people 
acquainted  with  iron  have  enshrined  in  hieroglyph- 
ics so  much  matter  of  historic  record  and  literary 
interest  as  the  Chinese  and  the  ancient  Egyptians, 
they  too  must  be  classed  as  civilized ; and  this  Mr. 
Morgan  by  implication  admits. 

This  brilliant  classification  of  the  stages  of  early 
culture  will  be  found  very  helpful  if  we  only  keep 
in  mind  the  fact  that  in  all  wide  generalizations 
of  this  sort  the  case  is  liable  to  be  somewhat  un- 
duly simplified.  The  story  of  human  progress  is 
really  not  quite  so  easy  to  decipher  as  such  de- 
scriptions would  make  it  appear,  and  when  we 
have  laid  down  rules  of  this  sort  we  need  not  be 
surprised  if  we  now  and  then  come  upon  facts 
that  will  not  exactly  fit  into  them.  In  such  an 

Et  flamma  atque  ignes,  postquam  sunt  cognita  primum. 

Posterius  ferri  vis  est,  serisque  reperta. 

Et  prior  seria  erat,  quam  ferri  cognitus  usus,  etc. 

Lucretius,  v.  1283. 

Perhaps,  as  Munro  suggests,  Lucretius  was  thinking  of  Hesiod ; 
hut  it  does  not  seem  improbable  that  in  both  cases  there  may 
have  been  a genuine  tradition  that  their  ancestors  used  bronze 
tools  and  weapons  before  iron,  since  the  change  was  comparatively 
recent,  and  sundry  religious  observances  tended  to  perpetuate  the 
memory  of  it. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


33 


event  it  is  best  not  to  try  to  squeeze  or  distort  the 
unruly  facts,  but  to  look  and  see  if  our  rules  will 
not  bear  some  little  qualification.  The  faculty 
for  generalizing  is  a good  servant  but  a bad  mas- 
ter. If  we  observe  this  caution  we  shall  find  Mr. 
Morgan’s  work  to  be  of  great  value.  It  will  be 
observed  that,  with  one  exception,  his  restrictions 
leave  the  area  of  civilization  as  wide  as  that  which 
we  are  accustomed  to  assign  to  it  in  our  ordinary 
speaking  and  thinking.  That  exception  is  the  case 
of  Mexico,  Central  America,  and  Peru.  We  have 
so  long  been  accustomed  to  gorgeous  accounts  of 
the  civilization  of  these  countries  at  the  time  of 
their  discovery  by  the  Spaniards  that  it  may  at 
first  shock  our  preconceived  notions  to  see  them 
set  down  as  in  the  “ middle  status  of  barbarism,” 
one  stage  higher  than  Mohawks,  and  one  stage 
lower  than  the  warriors  of  the  Iliad.  This  does 
indeed  mark  a change  since  Dr.  Draper  expressed 
the  opinion  that  the  Mexicans  and  Pe-  «.Civiliza_ 
ruvians  were  morally  and  intellectually 
superior  to  the  Europeans  of  the  six-  Peru* 
teenth  century.1  The  reaction  from  the  state  of 
opinion  in  which  such  an  extravagant  remark  was 
even  possible  has  been  attended  with  some  contro- 
versy ; but  on  the  whole  Mr.  Morgan’s  main  position 
has  been  steadily  and  rapidly  gaining  ground,  and 
it  is  becoming  more  and  more  clear  that  if  we  are 
to  use  language  correctly  when  we  speak  of  the  civ- 
ilizations of  Mexico  and  Peru  we  really  mean  civil- 
izations of  an  extremely  archaic  type,  considerably 

1 See  his  Intellectual  Development  of  Europe , New  York,  1863, 
pp.  448,  464. 


34 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


more  archaic  than  that  of  Egypt  in  the  time  of 
the  Pharaohs.  A “ civilization  ” like  that  of  the 
Aztecs,  without  domestic  animals  or  iron  tools, 
with  trade  still  in  the  primitive  stage  of  barter, 
with  human  sacrifices,  and  with  cannibalism,  has 
certainly  some  of  the  most  vivid  features  of  bar- 
barism. Along  with  these  primitive  features,  how- 
ever, there  seem  to  have  been  — after  making  all 
due  allowances  — some  features  of  luxury  and 
splendour  such  as  we  are  wont  to  associate  with 
civilization.  The  Aztecs,  moreover,  though  doubt- 
less a full  ethnical  period  behind  the  ancient 
Egyptians  in  general  advancement,  had  worked 
out  a system  of  hieroglyphic  writing,  and  had  be- 
gun to  put  it  to  some  literary  use.  It  would  seem 
that  a people  may  in  certain  special  points  reach 
a level  of  attainment  higher  than  the  level  which 
they  occupy  in  other  points.  The  Cave  men  of 
the  Glacial  period  were  ignorant  of  pottery,  and 
thus  had  not  risen  above  the  upper  status  of  sav- 
agery; but  their  artistic  talent,  upon  which  we 
have  remarked,  was  not  such  as  we  are  wont  to 
associate  with  savagery.  Other  instances  will  oc- 
cur to  us  in  the  proper  place. 

The  difficulty  which  people  usually  find  in  real- 
izing the  true  position  of  the  ancient  Mexican 
culture  arises  partly  from  the  misconceptions  which 
have  until  recently  distorted  the  facts,  and  partly 
from  the  loose  employment  of  terms  above  noticed. 
Loose  use  of  It  is  quite  correct  to  speak  of  the  Aus- 

“ savagery  ” tralian  blackfellows  as  “savages,”  but 
and  “civiliza-  , . . - , 

tion.”  nothing  is  more  common  than  to  near 

the  same  epithet  employed  to  characterize  Shaw- 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


35 


nees  and  Mohawks ; and  to  call  those  Indians 
“ savages  ” is  quite  misleading.  So  on  the  other 
hand  the  term  “ civilization”  is  often  so  loosely  used 
as  to  cover  a large  territory  belonging  to  “ barbar- 
ism.” One  does  not  look  for  scientific  precision 
in  newspapers,  but  they  are  apt  to  reflect  popular 
habits  of  thought  quite  faithfully,  and  for  that 
reason  it  is  proper  here  to  quote  from  one.  In  a 
newspaper  account  of  Mr.  Cushing’s  recent  discov- 
eries of  buried  towns,  works  of  irrigation,  etc.,  in 
Arizona,  we  are  first  told  that  these  are  the  remains 
of  a “splendid  prehistoric  civilization,”  and  the 
next  moment  we  are  told,  in  entire  unconsciousness 
of  the  contradiction,  that  the  people  who  con- 
structed these  works  had  only  stone  tools.  Now 
to  call  a people  “ civilized  ” who  have  only  stone 
tools  is  utterly  misleading.  Nothing  but  confusion 
of  ideas  and  darkening  of  counsel  can  come  from 
such  a misuse  of  words.  Such  a people  may  be  in 
a high  degree  interesting  and  entitled  to  credit  for 
what  they  have  achieved,  but  the  grade  of  culture 
which  they  have  reached  is  not  “ civilization.” 
With  “savagery”  thus  encroaching  upon  its 
area  of  meaning  on  the  one  side,  and  “ civilization  ” 
encroaching  on  the  other,  the  word  “ barbarism,” 
as  popularly  apprehended,  is  left  in  a vague  and 
unsatisfactory  plight.  If  we  speak  of  Montezuma’s 
people  as  barbarians  one  stage  further  advanced 
than  Mohawks,  we  are  liable  to  be  charged  with 
calling  them  “ savages.”  Yet  the  term  Value  ^ 

“ barbarism  ” is  a very  useful  one ; in-  °f 

dispensable,  indeed,  in  the  history  of  “barbariBm'” 
human  progress.  There  is  no  other  word  which 


36 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


can  serve  in  its  stead  as  a designation  of  the  enor- 
mous interval  which  begins  with  the  invention  of 
pottery  and  ends  with  the  invention  of  the  alphabet. 
The  popular  usage  of  the  word  is  likely  to  be- 
come more  definite  as  it  comes  to  be  more  generally 
realized  how  prodigious  that  interval  has  been. 
When  we  think  what  a considerable  portion  of 
man’s  past  existence  has  been  comprised  within  it, 
and  what  a marvellous  transformation  in  human 
knowledge  and  human  faculty  has  been  gradually 
wrought  between  its  beginning  and  its  end,  the 
period  of  barbarism  becomes  invested  with  most 
thrilling  interest,  and  its  name  ceases  to  appear 
otherwise  than  respectable.  It  is  Mr.  Morgan’s 
chief  title  to  fame  that  he  has  so  thoroughly  ex- 
plored this  period  and  described  its  features  with 
such  masterly  skill. 

It  is  worth  while  to  observe  that  Mr.  Morgan’s 
view  of  the  successive  stages  of  culture  is  one  which 
could  not  well  have  been  marked  out  in  all  its  parts 
except  by  a student  of  American  archaeology. 
Aboriginal  America  is  the  richest  field  in  the 
world  for  the  study  of  barbarism.  Its  people  pre- 
sent every  gradation  in  social  life  during  three 
ethnical  periods  — the  upper  period  of  savagery 
and  the  lower  and  middle  periods  of  barbarism  — 
so  that  the  process  of  development  may  be  most 
systematically  and  instructively  stud- 
barbarism  is  led.  U ntil  we  have  become  familiar  with 
pieteiy  exem-  ancient  American  society,  and  so  long 
Sent’ Amer-  as  our  view  is  confined  to  the  phases 
of  progress  in  the  Old  World,  the  de- 
marcation between  civilized  and  uncivilized  life 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


37 


seems  too  abrupt  and  sudden ; we  do  not  get  a cor- 
rect measure  of  it.  The  oldest  European  tradition 
reaches  back  only  through  the  upper  period  of  bar- 
barism.1 The  middle  and  lower  periods  have  lapsed 
into  utter  oblivion,  and  it  is  only  modem  archaeo- 
logical research  that  is  beginning  to  recover  the 
traces  of  them.  But  among  the  red  men  of  Amer- 
ica the  social  life  of  ages  more  remote  than  that 
of  the  lake  villages  of  Switzerland  is  in  many 
particulars  preserved  for  us  to-day,  and  when  we 
study  it  we  begin  to  realize  as  never  before  the  con- 
tinuity of  human  development,  its  enormous  durar 
tion,  and  the  almost  infinite  accumulation  of  slow 
efforts  by  which  progress  has  been  achieved.  An- 
cient America  is  further  instructive  in  presenting 
the  middle  status  of  barbarism  in  a different  form 
from  that  which  it  assumed  in  the  eastern  hemi- 
sphere. Its  most  conspicuous  outward  manifesta- 
tions, instead  of  tents  and  herds,  were  strange  and 
imposing  edifices  of  stone,  so  that  it  was  quite 
natural  that  observers  interpreting  it  from  a basis 
of  European  experience  should  mistake  it  for  civ- 
ilization. Certain  aspects  of  that  middle  period 
may  be  studied  to-day  in  New  Mexico  and  Arizona, 
as  phases  of  the  older  periods  may  still  be  found 
among  the  wilder  tribes,  even  after  all  the  contact 
they  have  had  with  white  men.  These  Survivals  of 

. , i.  . . bygone  epochs 

survivals  from  antiquity  will  not  per-  of  culture, 
manently  outlive  that  contact,  and  it  is  important 
that  no  time  should  be  lost  in  gathering  and  put- 

1 Now  and  then,  perhaps,  but  very  rarely,  it  just  touches  the 
close  of  the  middle  period,  as,  e.  g.,  in  the  lines  from  Hesiod  and 
Lucretius  above  quoted. 


38 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


ting  on  record  all  that  can  be  learned  of  the  speech 
and  arts,  the  customs  and  beliefs,  everything  that 
goes  to  constitute  the  philology  and  anthropology 
of  the  red  men.  For  the  intelligent  and  vigorous 
work  of  this  sort  now  conducted  by  the  Bureau  of 
Ethnology  of  the  Smithsonian  Institution,  under 
the  direction  of  Major  Powell,  no  praise  can  be  too 
strong  and  no  encouragement  too  hearty. 

A brief  enumeration  of  the  principal  groups  of 
Indians  will  be  helpful  in  enabling  us  to  compre- 
hend the  social  condition  of  ancient  America.  The 
groups  are  in  great  part  defined  by  differences  of 
language,  which  are  perhaps  a better  criterion  of 
racial  affinity  in  the  New  World  than  in  the  Old, 
because  there  seems  to  have  been  little  or  nothing 
of  that  peculiar  kind  of  conquest  with  incorporation 
resulting  in  complete  change  of  speech  which  we 
sometimes  find  in  the  Old  World ; as,  for  example, 
when  we  see  the  Celto-Iberian  population  of  Spain 
and  the  Belgic,  Celtic,  and  Aquitanian  populations 
of  Gaul  forgetting  their  native  tongues,  and  adopt- 
ing that  of  a confederacy  of  tribes  in  Latium. 
Except  in  the  case  of  Peru  there  is  no  indication 
that  anything  of  this  sort  went  on,  or  that  there 
Tribal  society  was  anything  even  superficially  analo- 
gy oflT1*  gous  to  “empire,”  in  ancient  America. 
o?fJnai  Amer-  What  strikes  one  most  forcibly  at  first 
is  the  vast  number  of  American  lan- 
guages. Adelung,  in  his  “ Mithridates,”  put  the 
number  at  1,264,  and  Ludewig,  in  his  “ Literature 
of  the  American  Languages,”  put  it  roundly  at 
1,100.  Squier,  on  the  other  hand,  was  content 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


39 


with  400.1  The  discrepancy  arises  from  the  fact 
that  where  one  scholar  sees  two  or  three  distinct 
languages  another  sees  two  or  three  dialects  of 
one  language  and  counts  them  as  one;  it  is  like 
the  difficulty  which  naturalists  find  in  agreeing  as 
to  what  are  species  and  what  are  only  varieties. 
The  great  number  of  languages  and  dialects 
spoken  by  a sparse  population  is  one  mark  of  the 
universal  prevalence  of  a rude  and  primitive  form 
of  tribal  society.2 3 * * * 

The  lowest  tribes  in  North  America  were  those 
that  are  still  to  be  found  in  California,  in  the  val- 
ley of  the  Columbia  river,  and  on  the  shores  of 
Puget  Sound.  The  Athabaskans  of  Hudson’s 
Bay  were  on  about  the  same  level  of  savagery. 
They  made  no  pottery,  knew  nothing  of  horticul- 
ture, depended  for  subsistence  entirely 
upon  bread-roots,  nsh,  and  game,  and  upper  status 
thus  had  no  village  life.  They  were  ° 88  &gery 
mere  prowlers  in  the  upper  status  of  savagery.8 
The  Apaches  of  Arizona,  preeminent  even  among 
red  men  for  atrocious  cruelty,  are  an  offshoot 
from  the  Athabaskan  stock.  Very  little  better 
are  the  Shoshones  and  Bannocks  that  still  wander 


1 Winsor,  “ Bibliographical  Notes  on  American  Linguistics,” 
in  his  Narr.  and  Crit.  Hist.,  yol.  i.  pp.  420-428,  gives  an  admirable 
survey  of  the  subject.  See  also  Pilling’s  bibliographical  bulletins 
of  Iroquoian,  Siouan,  and  Muskhogean  languages,  published  by  the 
Bureau  of  Ethnology. 

2 Excursions  of  an  Evolutionist , pp.  147-174. 

3 For  a good  account  of  Indians  in  the  upper  status  of  savagery 

until  modified  by  contact  with  civilization,  see  Myron  Eells,  “ The 

Twana,  Chemakum,  and  Klallam  Indians  of  Washington  Terri- 

tory,” Smithsonian  Report,  1887,  pp.  605-681. 


40 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


among  the  lonely  bare  mountains  and  over  the 
weird  sage-brush  plains  of  Idaho.  The  region 
west  of  the  Eocky  Mountains  and  north  of  New 
Mexico  is  thus  the  region  of  savagery. 

Between  the  Eocky  Mountains  and  the  Atlantic 
coast  the  aborigines,  at  the  time  of  the  Discovery, 
might  have  been  divided  into  six  or  seven  groups, 
of  which  three  were  situated  mainly  to  the  east 
cf  the  Mississippi  river,  the  others  mainly  to  the 
west  of  it.  All  were  in  the  lower  period  of  bar- 
barism. Of  the  western  groups,  by  far 

The  Dakota  , & r \ 

family  of  the  most  numerous  were  the  Dakotas, 
comprising  the  Sioux,  Poncas,  Omahas, 
Iowas,  Kaws,  Otoes,  and  Missouris.  From  the 
headwaters  of  the  Mississippi  their  territory  ex- 
tended westward  on  both  sides  of  the  Missouri  for 
a thousand  miles.  One  of  their  tribes,  the  Win- 
nebagos,  had  crossed  the  Mississippi  and  pressed 
into  the  region  between  that  river  and  Lake 
Michigan. 

A second  group,  very  small  in  numbers  but  ex- 
tremely interesting  tc  the  student  of  ethnology, 
comprises  the  Minnitarees  and  Mandans  on  the 
upper  Missouri.1  The  remnants  of  these  tribes 
now  live  together  in  the  same  village,  and  in  per- 
sonal appearance,  as  well  as  in  intelligence,  they 
are  described  as  superior  to  any  other  red  men 

1 An  excellent  description  of  them,  profusely  illustrated  with 
coloured  pictures,  may  be  found  in  Catlin’s  North  American  In- 
dians, vol.  i.  pp.  66-207,  7th  ed.,  London,  1848 ; the  author  was 
an  accurate  and  trustworthy  observer.  Some  writers  have  placed 
these  tribes  in  the  Dakota  group  because  of  the  large  number  of 
Dakota  words  in  their  language  ; but  these  are  probably  borrowed 
words,  like  the  numerous  French  words  in  English. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  41 

north  of  New  Mexico.  From  their  first  discov- 
ery, by  the  brothers  La  Verendrye  TheMinni 
in  1742,  down  to  Mr.  Gatlin’s  visit  taree.and 
nearly  a century  later,  there  was  no 
change  in  their  condition,1  but  shortly  afterward, 
in  1838,  the  greater  part  of  them  were  swept 
away  by  small-pox.  The  excellence  of  their  horti- 
culture, the  framework  of  their  houses,  and  their 
peculiar  religious  ceremonies  early  attracted  at- 
tention. Upon  Mr.  Catlin  they  made  such  an 
impression  that  he  fancied  there  must  be  an  infu- 
sion of  white  blood  in  them ; and  after  the  fashion 
of  those  days  he  sought  to  account  for  it  by  a ref- 
erence to  the  legend  of  Madoc,  a Welsh  prince 
who  was  dimly  imagined  to  have  sailed  to  America 
about  1170.  He  thought  that  Madoc’s  party  might 
have  sailed  to  the  Mississippi  and  founded  a col- 
ony which  ascended  that  river  and  the  Ohio,  built 
the  famous  mounds  of  the  Ohio  valley,  and  finally 
migrated  to  the  upper  Missouri.2  To  this  specu 
lation  was  appended  the  inevitable  list  of  words 
which  happen  to  sound  somewhat  alike  in  Man- 
dan  and  in  Welsh.  In  the  realm  of  free  fancy 
everything  is  easy.  That  there  was  a Madoc  who 
went  somewhere  in  1170  is  quite  possible,  but  as 
shrewd  old  John  Smith  said  about  it,  “where 
this  place  was  no  history  can  show.”8  But  one 

1 See  Francis  Parkman’s  paper,  “ The  Discovery  of  the  Rocky 
Mountains,”  Atlantic  Monthly , June,  1888.  I hope  the  appear- 
ance of  this  article,  two  years  ago,  indicates  that  we  have  not 
much  longer  to  wait  for  the  next  of  that  magnificent  series  of 
volumes  on  the  history  of  the  French  in  North  America. 

2 North  American  Indians , vol.  ii.,  Appendix  A. 

8 Smith’s  Generali  Histone  of  Virginia , New  England  and  the 
Summer  Isles , p.  1,  London,  1826. 


42 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


part  of  Mr.  Catlin’s  speculation  may  have  hit 
somewhat  nearer  the  truth.  It  is  possible  that 
the  Minnitarees  or  the  Mandans,  or  both,  may  be 
a remnant  of  some  of  those  Mound-builders  in 
the  Mississippi  valley  concerning  whom  something 
will  presently  be  said. 

The  third  group  in  this  western  region  consists 
of  the  Pawnees  and  Arickarees,1  of  the 
Pawnees,  etc.  p2a^e  va]jey  jn  Nebraska,  with  a few 

kindred  tribes  farther  to  the  south. 

Of  the  three  groups  eastward  of  the  Mississippi 
we  may  first  mention  the  Maskoki,  or  Muskhogees, 
Maskoki  fam-  consisting  of  the  Choctaws,  Chickasaws, 
Uy*  Seminoles,  and  others,  with  the  Creek 

confederacy.2  These  tribes  were  intelligent  and 
powerful,  with  a culture  well  advanced  toward 
the  end  of  the  lower  period  of  barbarism. 

The  Algonquin  family,  bordering  at  its  south- 
ern limits  upon  the  Maskoki,  had  a vast  range 
northeasterly  along  the  Atlantic  coast  until  it 
reached  the  confines  of  Labrador,  and  north- 
westerly through  the  region  of  the  Great  Lakes 
and  as  far  as  the  Churchill  river 3 to  the  west  of 

1 For  the  history  and  ethnology  of  these  interesting  tribes,  see 
three  learned  papers  by  J.  B.  Dunbar,  in  Magazine  of  American 
History,  vol.  iv.  pp.  241-281 ; vol.  v.  pp.  321-342 ; vol.  viii.  pp. 
734-756;  also  Grinnell’s  Pawnee  Hero  Stories  and  Folk-Tales , 
New  York,  1889. 

2 These  tribes  of  the  Gulf  region  were  formerly  grouped,  along 
with  others  not  akin  to  them,  as  “Mobilians.”  The  Cherokees 
were  supposed  to  belong  to  the  Maskoki  family,  but  they  have 
lately  been  declared  an  intrusive  offshoot  from  the  Iroquois  stock. 
The  remnants  of  another  alien  tribe,  the  once  famous  Natchez, 
were  adopted  into  the  Creek  confederacy.  For  a full  account  of 
these  tribes,  see  Gatschet,  A Migration  Legend  of  the  Creek  In- 
dians, vol.  i. , Philadelphia,  1884. 

3 Howse,  Grammar  of  the  Cree  Language,  London,  1865,  p.  vii. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


43 


Hudson’s  Bay.  In  other  words,  the  Algonquins 
were  bounded  on  the  south  by  the  Maskoki,1  on 
the  west  by  the  Dakotas,  on  the  north- 

" Algonquin 

west  by  the  Athabaskans,  on  the  north-  family  o i 
east  by  Eskimos,  and  on  the  east  by 
the  ocean.  Between  Lake  Superior  and  the  Red 
River  of  the  North  the  Crees  had  their  hunting 
grounds,  and  closely  related  to  them  were  the 
Pottawatomies,  Ojibwas,  and  Ottawas.  One  off- 
shoot, including  the  Blackfeet,  Cheyennes,  and 
Arrapahos,  roamed  as  far  west  as  the  Rocky 
Mountains.  The  great  triangle  between  the  up- 
per Mississippi  and  the  Ohio  was  occupied  by  the 
Menomonees  and  Kickapoos,  the  Sacs  and  Foxes, 
the  Miamis  and  Illinois,  and  the  Shawnees.  Along 
the  coast  region  the  principal  Algonquin  tribes 
were  the  Powhatans  of  Virginia,  the  Lenape  or 
Delawares,  the  Munsees  or  Minisinks  of  the  moun- 
tains about  the  Susquehanna,  the  Mohegans  on 
the  Hudson,  the  Adirondacks  between  that  river 
and  the  St.  Lawrence,  the  Narragansetts  and  their 
congeners  in  New  England,  and  finally  the  Mic- 
macs  and  Wabenaki  far  down  East,  as  the  last 
name  implies.  There  is  a tradition,  supported  to 
some  extent  by  linguistic  evidence,2  that  the  Mo- 
hegans, with  their  cousins  the  Pequots,  were  more 
closely  related  to  the  Shawnees  than  to  the  Dela- 
ware or  coast  group.  While  all  the  Algonquin 
tribes  were  in  the  lower  period  of  barbarism,  there 
was  a noticeable  gradation  among  them,  the  Crees 

1 Except  in  so  far  as  the  Cherokees  and  Tuscaroras,  presently 
to  be  mentioned,  were  interposed. 

2 Brinton,  The  Lenape  and  their  Legends , p.  30. 


44 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


and  Ojibwas  of  the  far  North  standing  lowest  in 
culture,  and  the  Shawnees,  at  their  southernmost 
limits,  standing  highest. 

We  have  observed  the  Dakota  tribes  pressing 
eastward  against  their  neighbours  and  sending  out 
an  offshoot,  the  Winnebagos,  across  the  Missis- 
sippi river.  It  has  been  supposed  that  the  Huron- 

Iroquois  group  of  tribes  was  a more  re- 

Huron-Iro-  r*  ^ . 

qrois  family  of  mote  offshoot  from  the  Dakotas.  This 

tribes.  . ticti  . . 

is  very  doubtful ; but  m the  thirteenth 
or  fourteenth  century  the  general  trend  of  the  Hu- 
ron-Iroquois  movement  seems  to  have  been  east- 
ward, either  in  successive  swarms,  or  in  a single 
swarm,  which  became  divided  and  scattered  by 
segmentation,  as  was  common  with  all  Indian 
tribes.  They  seem  early  to  have  proved  their 
superiority  over  the  Algonquins  in  bravery  and 
intelligence.  Their  line  of  invasion  seems  to  have 
run  eastward  to  Niagara,  and  thereabouts  to  have 
bifurcated,  one  line  following  the  valley  of  the  St. 
Lawrence,  and  the  other  that  of  the  Susquehanna. 
The  Hurons  established  themselves  in  the  penin- 
sula between  the  lake  that  bears  their  name  and 
Lake  Ontario.  South  of  them  and  along  the 
northern  shore  of  Lake  Erie  were  settled  their 
kindred,  afterward  called  the  “ Neutral  Nation.”  1 
On  the  southern  shore  the  Eries  planted  themselves, 
while  the  Susquehannocks  pushed  on  in  a direc- 
tion sufficiently  described  by  their  name.  Farthest 

1 Because  they  refused  to  take  part  in  the  strife  between  the 
Hurons  and  the  Five  Nations.  Their  Indian  name  was  Attiwan- 
darons.  They  were  unsurpassed  for  ferocity.  See  Parkman, 
Jesuits  in  North  America , p.  xliv. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


45 


of  all  penetrated  the  Tuscaroras,  even  into  the 
pine  forests  of  North  Carolina,  where  they  main- 
tained themselves  in  isolation  from  their  kindred 
until  1715.  These  invasions  resulted  in  some  dis- 
placement of  Algonquin  tribes,  and  began  to  sap 
the  strength  of  the  confederacy  or  alliance  in 
which  the  Delawares  had  held  a foremost  place. 

But  by  far  the  most  famous  and  important  of 
the  Huron-Iroquois  were  those  that  followed  the 
northern  shore  of  Lake  Ontario  into  the  valley  of 
the  St.  Lawrence.  In  that  direction  their  progress 
was  checked  by  the  Algonquin  tribe  of  Adiron- 
dacks,  but  they  succeeded  in  retaining  a foothold 
in  the  country  for  a long  time  ; for  in  1535  Jacques 
Cartier  found  on  the  site  which  he  named  Mont- 
real an  Iroquois  village  which  had  vanished  before 
Champlain’s  arrival  seventy  years  later.  Those 
Iroquois  who  were  thrust  back  in  the  struggle  for 
the  St.  Lawrence  valley,  early  in  the  fifteenth 
century,  made  their  way  across  Lake  Ontario  and 
established  themselves  at  the  mouth  of  the  Oswego 
river.  They  were  then  in  three  small  tribes,  — the 
Mohawks,  Onondagas,  and  Senecas,  — but  as  they 
grew  in  numbers  and  spread  eastward  to  the  Hud- 
son and  westward  to  the  Genesee,  the  intermediate 
tribes  of  Oneidas  and  Cayugas  were  formed  by  seg- 
mentation.1 About  1450  the  five  tribes  — after- 
wards known  as  the  Five  Nations — The  Fire 
were  joined  in  a confederacy  in  pursu-  Nations- 
ance  of  the  wise  counsel  which  Hayowentha,  or 
Hiawatha,2  according  to  the  legend,  whispered  into 

1 Morgan,  Ancient  Society,  p.  126. 

3 Whether  there  was  ever  such  a person  as  Hiawatha  is,  to  say 


46 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


the  ears  of  the  Onondaga  sachem,  Daganoweda. 
This  union  of  their  resources  combined,  with  their 
native  bravery  and  cunning,  and  their  occupation  of 
the  most  commanding  military  position  in  eastern 
North  America,  to  render  them  invincible  among 
red  men.  They  exterminated  their  old  enemies 
the  Adirondacks,  and  pushed  the  Mohegans  over 
the  mountains  from  the  Hudson  river  to  the  Con- 
necticut. When  they  first  encountered  white  men 
in  1609  their  name  had  become  a terror  in  New 
England,  insomuch  that  as  soon  as  a single  Mohawk 
was  caught  sight  of  by  the  Indians  in  that  country, 
they  would  raise  the  cry  from  hill  to  hill,  “ A Mo- 
hawk ! a Mohawk ! ” and  forthwith  would  flee  like 
sheep  before  wolves,  never  dreaming  of  resistance.1 

After  the  Five  Nations  had  been  supplied  with 
firearms  by  the  Dutch  their  power  increased  with 
portentous  rapidity.2  At  first  they  sought  to  per- 
suade their  neighbours  of  kindred  blood  and  speech, 
the  Eries  and  others,  to  join  their  confederacy ; 

the  least,  doubtful.  As  a traditional  culture-hero  his  attributes 
are  those  of  Ioskeha  Michabo,  Quetzalcoatl,  Viracocha,  and  all 
that  class  of  sky-gods  to  which  I shall  again  have  occasion  to  refer. 
See  Brinton’s  Myths  of  the  New  World , p.  172.  When  the  Indian 
speaks  of  Hiawatha  whispering  advice  to  Daganoweda,  his  mean- 
ing is  probably  the  same  as  that  of  the  ancient  Greek  when  he 
attributed  the  wisdom  of  some  mortal  hero  to  whispered  advice  from 
Zeus  or  his  messenger  Hermes.  Longfellow’s  famous  poem  is 
based  upon  Schoolcraft’s  book  entitled  The  Hiawatha  Legends , 
which  is  really  a misnomer,  for  the  book  consists  chiefly  of  Ojibwa 
stories  about  Manabozho,  son  of  the  West  Wind.  There  was 
really  no  such  legend  of  Hiawatha  as  that  which  the  poet  has 
immortalized.  See  Hale,  The  Iroquois  Booh  of  Rites , pp.  36, 
180-183. 

1 Cadwallader  Colden,  History  of  the  Five  Nations,  New  York, 
1727. 

2 Morgan,  League  of  the  Iroquois,  p.  12. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


47 


and  failing  in  this  they  went  to  war  and  extermi- 
nated them.1  Then  they  overthrew  one  Algonquin 
tribe  after  another  until  in  1690  their  career  was 
checked  by  the  French.  By  that  time  they  had 
reduced  to  a tributary  condition  most  of  the  Algon- 
quin tribes,  even  to  the  Mississippi  river.  Some 
writers  have  spoken  of  the  empire  of  the  Iroquois, 
and  it  has  been  surmised  that,  if  they  had  not  been 
interfered  with  by  white  men,  they  might  have 
played  a part  analogous  to  that  of  the  Romans  in 
the  Old  World ; but  there  is  no  real  similarity  be- 
tween the  two  cases.  The  Romans  acquired  their 
mighty  strength  by  incorporating  vanquished  peo- 
ples into  their  own  body  politic.2  No  American 
aborigines  ever  had  a glimmering  of  the  process  of 
state-building  after  the  Roman  fashion.  No  incor- 
poration resulted  from  the  victories  of  the  Iroquois. 
Where  their  burnings  and  massacres  stopped  short 
of  extermination,  they  simply  took  tribute,  which 
was  as  far  as  state-craft  had  got  in  the  lower  period 
of  barbarism.  General  Walker  has  summed  up 
their  military  career  in  a single  sentence : “ They 

were  the  scourge  of  God  upon  the  aborigines  of 
the  continent.”  3 

The  six  groups  here  enumerated  — Dakota, 
Mandan,  Pawnee,  Maskoki,  Algonquin,  Iroquois 

1 All  except  the  distant  Tuscaroras,  who  in  1715  migrated  from 
North  Carolina  to  New  York,  and  joining  the  Iroqnois  league 
made  it  the  Six  Nations.  All  the  rest  of  the  outlying  Huron- 
Iroquois  stock  was  wiped  out  of  existence  before  the  end  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  except  the  remnant  of  Hurons  since  known 
as  Wyandots. 

2 See  my  Beginnings  of  New  England , chap.  i. 

8 F.  A.  Walker,  “The  Indian  Question,”  North  American  Re- 
view, April,  1873,  p.  370. 


48 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


— made  up  the  great  body  of  the  aborigines  of 
North  America  who  at  the  time  of  the  Discovery 
lived  in  the  lower  status  of  barbarism.  All  made 
pottery  of  various  degrees  of  rudeness.  Their 
tools  and  weapons  were  of  the  Neolithic  type, — 
stone  either  polished  or  accurately  and 

Horticulture 

mustbedis-  artistically  chipped.  tor  the  most 
from  field  part  they  lived  in  stockaded  villages, 
and  cultivated  maize,  beans,  pumpkins, 
squashes,  sunflowers,  and  tobacco.  They  depended 
for  subsistence  partly  upon  such  vegetable  prod- 
ucts, partly  upon  hunting  and  fishing,  the  women 
generally  attending  to  the  horticulture,  the  men  to 
the  chase.  Horticulture  is  an  appropriate  desig- 
nation for  this  stage  in  which  the  ground  is  merely 
scratched  with  stone  spades  and  hoes.  It  is  incip- 
ient agriculture,  but  should  be  carefully  distin- 
guished from  the  field  agriculture  in  which  exten- 
sive pieces  of  land  are  subdued  by  the  plough. 
The  assistance  of  domestic  animals  is  needed  be- 
fore such  work  can  be  carried  far,  and  it  does  not 
appear  that  there  was  an  approach  to  field  agri- 
culture in  any  part  of  pre-Columbian  America 
except  Peru,  where  men  were  harnessed  to  the 
plough,  and  perhaps  occasionally  llamas  were  used 
in  the  same  way.1  Where  subsistence  depended 
upon  rude  horticulture  eked  out  by  game  and  fish, 
it  required  a large  territory  to  support  a sparse 
population.  The  great  diversity  of  languages 
contributed  to  maintain  the  isolation  of  tribes 
and  prevent  extensive  confederation.  Intertribal 

1 See  Humboldt,  Ansichten  der  Natur,  3d  ed.,  Stuttgart,  1849, 
vol.  i.  p.  203. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


49 


warfare  was  perpetual,  save  now  and  then  for 
truces  of  brief  duration.  Warfare  was  attended 
by  wholesale  massacre.  As  many  prisoners  as 
could  be  managed  were  taken  home  by  perpetual 
their  captors ; in  some  cases  they  were  warfare- 
adopted  into  the  tribe  of  the  latter  as  a means  of 
increasing  its  fighting  strength,  otherwise  they 
were  put  to  death  with  lingering  torments.1  There 
was  nothing  which  afforded  the  red  men  such  ex- 
quisite delight  as  the  spectacle  of  live  human  flesh 
lacerated  with  stone  knives  or  hissing  under  the 
touch  of  firebrands,  and  for  elaborate  ingenuity  in 
devising  tortures  they  have  never  been  equalled.2 

1 “ Women  and  children  joined  in  these  fiendish  atrocities,  and 
when  at  length  the  victim  yielded  up  his  life,  his  heart,  if  he  were 
brave,  was  ripped  from  his  body,  cut  in  pieces,  broiled,  and  given 
to  the  young  men,  under  the  belief  that  it  would  increase  their 
courage;  they  drank  his  blood,  thinking  it  would  make  them 
more  wary;  and  finally  his  body  was  divided  limb  from  limb, 
roasted  or  thrown  into  the  seething  pot,  and  hands  and  feet, 
arms  and  legs,  head  and  trunk,  were  all  stewed  into  a horrid 
mess  and  eaten  amidst  yells,  songs,  and  dances.”  Jeffries  Wy- 
man, in  Seventh  Report  of  Peabody  Museum , p.  37.  For  details 
of  the  most  appalling  character,  see  Butterfield’s  History  of  the 
Girtys,  pp.  176-182  ; Stone’s  Life  of  Joseph  Brant,  vol.  ii.  pp.  31, 
32;  Dodge’s  Plains  of  the  Great  West,  p.  418,  and  Our  Wild  In- 
dians, pp.  525-529;  Parkman’s  Jesuits  in  North  America , pp. 
387-391 ; and  many  other  places  in  Parkman’s  writings. 

2 One  often  hears  it  said  that  the  cruelty  of  the  Indians  was 
not  greater  than  that  of  mediaeval  Europeans,  as  exemplified  in 
judicial  torture  and  in  the  horrors  of  the  Inquisition.  But  in 
such  a judgment  there  is  lack  of  due  discrimination.  In  the 
practice  of  torture  by  civil  and  ecclesiastical  tribunals  in  the 
Middle  Ages,  there  was  a definite  moral  purpose  which,  however 
lamentably  mistaken  or  perverted,  gave  it  a very  different  char- 
acter from  torture  wantonly  inflicted  for  amusement.  The  atro- 
cities formerly  attendant  upon  the  sack  of  towns,  as  e.  g.  Beziers, 
Magdeburg,  etc.,  might  more  properly  be  regarded  as  an  illustra- 


50  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA, 

Cannibalism  was  quite  commonly  practised.1  The 

tion  of  the  survival  of  a spirit  fit  only  for  the  lowest  barbarism  : 
and  the  Spanish  conquerors  of  the  New  World  themselves  often 
exhibited  cruelty  such  as  even  Indians  seldom  surpass.  See  be- 
low, vol.  ii.  p.  444.  In  spite  of  such  eases,  however,  it  must  be 
held  that  for  artistic  skill  in  inflicting  the  greatest  possible  in- 
tensity of  excruciating  pain  upon  every  nerve  in  the  body,  the 
Spaniard  was  a bungler  and  a novice  as  compared  with  the  In- 
dian. See  Dodge’s  Our  Wild  Indians , pp.  536-538.  Colonel 
Dodge  was  in  familiar  contact  with  Indians  for  more  than  thirty 
years,  and  writes  with  fairness  and  discrimination. 

In  truth  the  question  as  to  comparative  cruelty  is  not  so  much 
one  of  race  as  of  occupation,  except  in  so  far  as  race  is  moulded 
by  long  occupation.  The  “ old  Adam,”  i.  e.  the  inheritance  from 
our  brute  ancestors,  is  very  stiong  in  the  human  race.  Callous- 
ness to  the  suffering  of  others  than  self  is  part  of  this  brute-in- 
heritance, and  under  the  influence  of  certain  habits  and  occu- 
pations this  germ  of  callousness  may  be  developed  to  almost  any 
height  of  devilish  cruelty.  In  the  lower  stages  of  culture  the 
lack  of  political  aggregation  on  a l",rge  scale  is  attended  with 
incessant  warfare  in  the  shape  in  which  it  comes  home  to  every- 
body’s door.  This  state  of  things  keeps  alive  the  passion  of  re- 
venge and  stimulates  cruelty  to  the  highest  degree.  As  long  as 
such  a state  of  things  endures,  as  it  did  in  Europe  to  a limited 
extent  throughout  the  Middle  Ages,  there  is  sure  to  be  a dread- 
ful amount  of  cruelty.  The  change  in  the  conditions  of  modern 
warfare  has  been  a very  important  factor  in  the  rapidly  increas- 
ing mildness  and  humanity  of  modern  times.  See  my  Beginnings 
of  New  England , pp.  226-229.  Something  more  will  be  said 
hereafter  with  reference  to  the  special  causes  concerned  in  the 
cruelty  and  brutality  of  the  Spaniards  in  America.  Meanwhile 
it  may  be  observed  in  the  present  connection,  that  the  Spanish 
taskmasters  who  mutilated  and  burned  their  slaves  were  not  rep- 
resentative types  of  their  own  race  to  anything  like  the  same 
extent  as  the  Indians  who  tortured  Br^beuf  or  Crawford.  If 
the  fiendish  Pedrarias  was  a Spaniard,  so  too  was  the  saintly  Las 
Casas.  The  latter  type  would  be  as  impossible  among  barbari- 
ans as  an  Aristotle  or  a Beethoven.  Indeed,  though  there  are 
writers  who  would  like  to  prove  the  contrary,  it  may  be  doubted 
whether  that  type  has  ever  attained  to  perfection  except  under 
the  influence  of  Christianity. 

1 See  the  evidence  collected  by  Jeffries  Wyman,  in  Seventh  Re> 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


51 


scalps  of  slain  enemies  were  always  taken,  and 
until  they  had  attained  such  trophies  the  young 
men  were  not  likely  to  find  favour  in  the  eyes  of 
women.  The  Indian’s  notions  of  morality  were 
those  that  belong  to  that  state  of  society  in  which 
the  tribe  is  the  largest  well-established  political 
aggregate.  Murder  without  the  tribe  was  meri- 
torious unless  it  entailed  risk  of  war  at  an  obvious 
disadvantage ; murder  within  the  tribe  was  either 
revenged  by  blood-feud  or  compounded  by  a pres- 
ent given  to  the  victim’s  kinsmen.  Such  rudi- 
mentary wergild  was  often  reckoned  in  wampum, 
or  strings  of  beads  made  of  a kind  of  mussel  shell, 
and  put  to  divers  uses,  as  personal  ornament, 
mnemonic  record,  and  finally  money.  Religious 
thought  was  in  the  fetishistic  or  animistic  stage,1 
while  many  tribes  had  risen  to  a vague  conception 
of  tutelar  deities  embodied  in  human  or  animal 
forms.  Myth-tales  abounded,  and  the  folk-lore  of 
the  red  men  is  found  to  be  extremely  interesting 
and  instructive.2  Their  religion  consisted  mainly 

port  of  Peabody  Museum , pp.  27-37 ; cf.  Wake,  Evolution  of  Mo- 
rality, yoI.  i.  p.  243.  Many  illustrations  are  given  by  Mr.  Park- 
man.  In  this  connection  it  may  be  observed  that  the  name 
“Mohawk”  means  “Cannibal.”  It  is  an  Algonquin  word,  ap- 
plied to  this  Iroquois  tribe  by  their  enemies  in  the  Connecticut 
valley  and  about  the  lower  Hudson.  The  name  by  which  the 
Mohawks  called  themselves  was  “ Caniengas,”  or  “ People-at- 
the-Flint.”  See  Hale,  The  Iroquois  Book  of  Rites , p.  173. 

1 For  accounts  and  explanations  of  animism  see  Tylor’s  Primi- 
tive Culture , London,  1871,  2 vols. ; Caspari,  XJrgeschickte  der 
Menschheit , Leipsic,  1877,  2 vols. ; Spencer’s  Principles  of  Soci- 
ology, part  i. ; and  my  Myths  and  Mythmakers,  chap.  vii. 

2 No  time  should  be  lost  in  gathering  and  recording  every 
scrap  of  this  folk-lore  that  can  be  found.  The  American  Folk- 
Lore  Society,  founded  chiefly  through  the  exertions  of  my  friend 


52  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

in  a devout  belief  in  witchcraft.  No  well-defined 
priestly  class  had  been  evolved;  the  so-called 
“medicine  men”  were  mere  conjurers,  though 
possessed  of  considerable  influence. 

But  none  of  the  characteristics  of  barbarous 
society  above  specified  will  carry  us  so  far  toward 
realizing  the  gulf  which  divides  it  from  civilized 
society  as  the  imperfect  development  of  its  do- 
mestic relations.  The  importance  of  this  subject 
is  such  as  to  call  for  a few  words  of  special  eluci- 
dation. 

Thirty  years  ago,  when  Sir  Henry  Maine  pub- 
lished that  magnificent  treatise  on  Ancient  Law, 
which,  when  considered  in  all  its  potency  of  sug- 
gestiveness, has  perhaps  done  more  than  any 
other  single  book  of  our  century  toward  placing 
the  study  of  history  upon  a,  scientific  basis,  he  be- 
gan by  showing  that  in  primitive  soci- 
ety the  individual  is  nothing  and  the 
state  nothing,  while  the  family-group  is  everything, 
and  that  the  progress  of  civilization  politically  has 


Mr.  W.  W.  Newell,  and  organized  January  4, 1888,  is  already  doing 
excellent  work  and  promises  to  become  a valuable  aid,  within  its 
field,  to  the  work  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology.  Of  the  Journal 
of  American  Folk-Lore , published  for  the  society  by  Messrs. 
Houghton,  Mifflin  & Co.,  nine  numbers  have  appeared,  and  the 
reader  will  find  them  full  of  valuable  information.  One  may  also 
profitably  consult  Knortz’s  Mahrchen  und  Sagen  der  nordamerika- 
nischen  Indianer , Jena,  1871 ; Brinton’s  Myths  of  the  New  World, 
N.  Y.,  1868,  and  his  American  Hero-Myths,  Phila.,  1882  ; Leland’s 
Algonquin  Legends  of  New  England,  Boston,  1884 ; Mrs.  Emerson’s 
Indian  Myths,  Boston,  1884.  Some  brief  reflections  and  criticisms 
of  much  value,  in  relation  to  aboriginal  American  folk-lore,  may 
be  found  in  Curtin’s  Myths  and  Folk-Lore  of  Ireland,  pp.  12-27. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


53 


consisted  on  the  one  hand  in  the  aggregation  and 
building  up  of  family-groups  through  intermediate 
tribal  organizations  into  states,  and  on  the  other 
hand  in  the  disentanglement  of  individuals  from 
the  family  thraldom.  In  other  words,  we  began 
by  having  no  political  communities  larger  than 
clans,  and  no  bond  of  political  union  except  blood 
relationship,  and  in  this  state  of  things  the  indi- 
vidual, as  to  his  rights  and  obligations,  was  sub- 
merged in  the  clan.  We  at  length  come  to  have 
great  nations  like  the  English  or  the  French,  in 
which  blood-relationship  as  a bond  of  political 
union  is  no  longer  indispensable  or  even  much 
thought  of,  and  in  which  the  individual  citizen  is 
the  possessor  of  legal  rights  and  subject  to  legal 
obligations.  No  one  in  our  time  can  forget  how 
beautifully  Sir  Henry  Maine,  with  his  profound 
knowledge  of  early  Aryan  law  and  custom,  from 
Ireland  to  Hindustan,  delineated  the  slow  growth 
of  individual  ownership  of  property  and  individ- 
ual responsibility  for  delict  and  crime  out  of  an 
earlier  stage  in  which  ownership  and  responsibility 
belonged  only  to  family-groups  or  clans. 

In  all  these  brilliant  studies  Sir  Henry  Maine 
started  with  the  patriarchal  family  as  we  find  it  at 
the  dawn  of  history  among  all  peoples  of  Aryan 
and  Semitic  speech,  — the  patriarchal 
family  of  the  ancient  Roman  and  the  ^h£afSaUy 
ancient  Jew,  the  family  in  which  kin-  notprmutlve< 
ship  is  reckoned  through  males,  and  in  which  all 
authority  centres  in  the  eldest  male,  and  descends 
to  his  eldest  son.  Maine  treated  this  patriarchal 
family  as  primitive ; but  his  great  book  had  hardly 


54 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


appeared  when  other  scholars,  more  familiar  than 
he  with  races  in  savagery  or  in  the  lower  status  of 
barbarism,  showed  that  his  view  was  too  restricted. 
We  do  not  get  back  to  primitive  society  by  study- 
ing Greeks,  Romans,  and  Jews,  peoples  who  had 
nearly  emerged  from  the  later  period  of  barbarism 
when  we  first  know  them.1  Their  patriarchal  fam- 
ily was  perfected  in  shape  during  the  later  period 
of  barbarism,  and  it  was  preceded  by  a much  ruder 
and  less  definite  form  of  family-group  in  which 
kinship  was  reckoned  only  through  the  mother, 
and  the  headship  never  descended  from  father  to 
son.  As  so  often  happens,  this  discovery  was 
made  almost  simultaneously  by  two  investigators, 
each  working  in  ignorance  of  what  the  other  was 
doing.  In  1861,  the  same  year  in  which  “ Ancient 
Law  ” was  published,  Professor  Bachofen,  of  Basel, 
“ Mother-  published  his  famous  book,  “ Das  Mut- 
terrecht,”  of  which  his  co-discoverer  and 
rival,  after  taking  exception  to  some  of  his  state- 
ments, thus  cordially  writes  : “ It  remains,  how- 


1 Until  lately  our  acquaintance  with  human  history  was  derived 
almost  exclusively  from  literary  memorials,  among  which  the 
Bible,  the  Homeric  poems,  and  the  Vedas,  carried  us  back  about 
as  far  as  literature  could  take  us.  It  was  natural,  therefore,  to 
suppose  that  the  society  of  the  times  of  Abraham  or  Agamemnon 
was  “primitive,”  and  the  wisest  scholars  reasoned  upon  such  an 
assumption.  With  vision  thus  restricted  to  civilized  man  and  his 
ideas  and  works,  people  felt  free  to  speculate  about  uncivilized 
races  (generally  grouped  together  indiscriminately  as  “ savages  ”) 
according  to  any  a priori  whim  that  might  happen  to  captivate 
their  fancy.  But  the  discoveries  of  the  last  half-century  have 
opened  such  stupendous  vistas  of  the  past  that  the  age  of  Abra- 
ham seems  but  as  yesterday.  The  state  of  society  described  in  the 
book  of  Genesis  had  five  entire  ethnical  periods,  and  che  greater 
part  of  a sixth,  behind  it ; and  its  institutions  were,  comparatively 
speaking,  modern. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


55 


ever,  after  all  qualifications  and  deductions,  that 
Bachofen,  before  any  one  else,  discovered  the  fact 
that  a system  of  kinship  through  mothers  only, 
had  anciently  everywhere  prevailed  before  the  tie 
of  blood  between  father  and  child  had  found  a 
place  in  systems  of  relationships.  And  the  honour 
of  that  discovery,  the  importance  of  which,  as 
affording  a new  starting-point  for  all  history,  can- 
not be  overestimated,  must  without  stint  or  qual- 
ification be  assigned  to  him.” 1 Such  are  the  gen- 
erous words  of  the  late  John  Ferguson  McLennan, 
who  had  no  knowledge  of  Bachofen’s  work  when 
his  own  treatise  on  “ Primitive  Marriage  ” was 
published  in  1865.  Since  he  was  so  modest  in  urg- 
ing his  own  claims,  it  is  due  to  the  Scotch  lawyer’s 
memory  to  say  that,  while  he  was  inferior  in  point 
of  erudition  to  the  Swiss  professor,  his  book  is  char- 
acterized by  greater  sagacity,  goes  more  Primitive 
directly  to  the  mark,  and  is  less  encum-  marriage' 
bered  by  visionary  speculations  of  doubtful  value.2 
Mr.  McLennan  proved,  from  evidence  collected 
chiefly  from  Australians  and  South  Sea  Islanders, 
and  sundry  non-Aryan  tribes  of  Hindustan  and 
Thibet,  that  systems  of  kinship  in  which  the  father 
is  ignored  exist  to-day,  and  he  furthermore  discov- 
ered unmistakable  and  very  significant  traces  of  the 
former  existence  of  such  a state  of  things  among 
the  Mongols,  the  Greeks  and  Phoenicians,  and  the 
ancient  Hebrews.  By  those  who  were  inclined  to 

1 McLennan’s  Studies  in  Ancient  History , comprising  a reprint  of 
Primitive  Marriage,  etc.  London,  1876,  p.  421. 

2 There  is  much  that  is  unsound  in  it,  however,  as  is  often 
inevitably  the  case  with  books  that  strike  boldly  into  a new  field 
of  inquiry. 


56 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


regard  Sir  Henry  Maine’s  views  as  final,  it  was 
argued  that  Mr.  McLennan’s  facts  were  of  a spo- 
radic and  exceptional  character.  But  when  the 
evidence  from  this  vast  archaic  world  of  America 
began  to  be  gathered  in  and  interpreted  by  Mr. 
Morgan,  this  argument  fell  to  the  ground,  and  as  to 
the  point  chiefly  in  contention,  Mr.  McLennan  was 

proved  to  be  right.  Throughout  abo- 
reckoning  riginal  America,  with  one  or  two  ex- 
through  ceptions,  kinship  was  reckoned  through 

females  only.  » , , . , . 

females  only,  and  m the  exceptional  in- 
stances the  vestiges  of  that  system  were  so  promi- 
nent as  to  make  it  clear  that  the  change  had  been 
but  recently  effected.  During  the  past  fifteen 
years,  evidence  has  accumulated  from  various 
parts  of  the  world,  until  it  k beginning  to  appear 
as  if  it  were  the  patriarchal  system  that  is  excep- 
tional, having  been  reached  only  by  the  highest 
races.1  Sir  Henry  Maine’s  work  has  lost  none  of 

1 A general  view  of  the  subject  may  he  obtained  from  the  fol- 
lowing works:  Bachofen,  Das  Mutterrecht,  Stuttgart,  1871, 
and  Die  Sage  von  Tanaquil,  Heidelberg,  1870;  MeLennan’s  Stud- 
ies in  Ancient  History , London,  1876,  and  The  Patriarchal 
Theory , London,  1884;  Morgan’s  Systems  of  Consanguinity 
(Smithsonian  Contributions  to  Knowledge,  vol.  xvii.),  Washing- 
ton, 1871,  and  Ancient  Society , New  York,  1877 ; Robertson 
Smith,  Kinship  and  Marriage  in  Early  Arabia , Cambridge,  Eng., 
1885;  Lubbock,  Origin  of  Civilization , 5th  ed.,  London,  1889; 
Giraud-Teulon,  La  Mere  chez  certains  peuples  de  V antiquite,  Paris, 
1867,  and  Les  Origines  de  la  Famille , Geneva,  1874 ; Starcke  (of 
Copenhagen),  The  Primitive  Family , London,  1889.  Some  criti- 
cisms upon  McLennan  and  Morgan  may  be  found  in  Maine’s  later 
works,  Early  History  of  Institutions , London,  1875,  and  Early 
Law  and  Custom , London,  1883.  By  far  the  ablest  critical  survey 
of  the  whole  field  is  that  in  Spencer’s  Principles  of  Sociology , vol. 
i.  pp.  621-797. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA . 


57 


its  value,  only,  like  all  human  work,  it  is  not  final ; 
it  needs  to  be  supplemented  by  the  further  study 
of  savagery  as  best  exemplified  in  Australia  and 
some  parts  of  Polynesia,  and  of  barbarism  as  best 
exemplified  in  America.  The  subject  is,  more- 
over, one  of  great  and  complicated  difficulty,  and 
leads  incidentally  to  many  questions  for  solving 
which  the  data  at  our  command  are  still  inade- 
quate. It  is  enough  for  us  now  to  observe  in 
general  that  while  there  are  plenty  of  instances 
of  change  from  the  system  of  reckoning  kinship 
only  through  females,  to  the  system  of  reckoning 
through  males,  there  do  not  appear  to  have  been 
any  instances  of  change  in  the  reverse  direction ; 
and  that  in  ancient  America  the  earlier  system 
was  prevalent. 

If  now  we  ask  the  reason  for  such  a system  of 
reckoning  kinship  and  inheritance,  so  strange  ac- 
cording to  all  our  modern  notions,  the  true  answer 
doubtless  is  that  which  was  given  by 
prudent  (rcTTwiievoi)  Telemachus  to  the  bod  for  the 
goddess  Athene  when  she  asked  him  to 
tell  her  truly  if  he  was  the  son  of  Odysseus : — 
“ My  mother  says  I am  his  son,  for  my  part,  I 
don’t  know ; one  never  knows  of  one’s  self  who  one’s 
father  is.” 1 Already,  no  doubt,  in  Homer’s  time 

1 ’'AAA’  &ye  fxoi  rSSe  ehre  teal  arpeKews  Kard\e^ov, 
ei  8)/  4£  aiiroio  t 6ffos  ttcus  eh  ’OSvaijos. 
aivws  y dp  Ke<pa \i]V  re  Kal  ofifiara  /caAa  eoiKas 
Kelvcp,  iirel  dapa  roTov  4puffy6fie&>  ctAA^Aouriy, 
irpiv  ye  rbv  4s  Tpolrfv  VajS^/uevai,  ivQa  irep  &W01 
*Apyeio)u  oi  &pi<rroi  ifrav  ko(\t]S  4irl  vrjvalv*  % 

4k  rov  8 ' otfr * ’OSuenja  4- ytbv  18ov  otir'  4 fib  Ke7vos. 

TV  S’  a3  TifXefiaxos  ireTrvvfievos  avrlov  i)&8a 


58 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


there  was  a gleam  of  satire  about  this  answer,  such 
as  it  would  show  on  a modern  page  ; but  in  more 
primitive  times  it  was  a very  serious  affair.  From 
what  we  know  of  the  ideas  and  practices  of  unciv- 
ilized tribes  all  over  the  world,  it  is  evident  that 
the  sacredness  of  the  family  based  upon  indissolu- 
ble marriage  is  a thing  of  comparatively  modern 
growth.  If  the  sexual  relations  of  the  Austra- 
lians, as  observed  to-day,1  are  an  improvement 
upon  an  antecedent  state  of  things,  that  antece- 
The  primeval  dent  state  must  have  been  sheer  pro- 
human  horde.  miscuity.  There  is  ample  warrant  for 

supposing,  with  Mr.  McLennan,  that  at  the  be- 
ginning of  the  lower  status  of  savagery,  long  since 
everywhere  extinct,  the  family  had  not  made  itself 
distinctly  visible,  but  men  Jived  in  a horde  very 
much  like  gregarious  brutes.2 * *  I have  shown  that 

to iy up  iyco  toi,  £e?j/e,  juaA'  arpeKews  ayopeia (a. 
p.'firrjp  jueV  t5  ip.4  (pr)(ri  tov  eju/zevai,  avrap  eyooye 
ovk  oW  • ov  ydp  ttu)  tis  eby  yovov  aurbs  aveyvco. 

Odyssey , i.  206. 

1 Lumholtz,  Among  Cannibals , p.  213;  Lubbock,  Origin  of 
Civilization , p.  107 ; Morgan,  Ancient  Society , part  iii.,  chap.  iii. 
“ After  battle  it  frequently  happens  among  the  native  tribes  of 
Australia  that  the  wives  of  the  conquered,  of  their  own  free-will, 
go  over  to  the  victors ; reminding  us  of  the  lioness  which,  quietly 
watching  the  fight  between  two  lions,  goes  off  with  the  con- 
queror.” Spencer,  Principles  of  Sociology , vol.  i.  p.  632. 

2 The  notion  of  the  descent  of  the  human  race  from  a single 

“pair,”  or  of  different  races  from  different  “ pairs,”  is  a curious 

instance  of  transferring  modern  institutions  into  times  primeval. 
Of  course  the  idea  is  absurd.  When  the  elder  Agassiz  so  em- 
phatically declared  that  “ pines  have  originated  in  forests,  heaths 
in  heaths,  grasses  in  prairies,  bees  in  hives,  herrings  in  shoals, 
buffaloes  in  herds,  men  in  nations  ” {Essay  on  Classification , Lon- 

don, 1859,  p.  58),  he  made,  indeed,  a mistake  of  the  same  sort, 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


59 


the  essential  difference  between  this  primeval  hu- 
man horde  and  a mere  herd  of  brutes  consisted  in 
the  fact  that  the  gradual  but  very  great  prolon- 
gation of  infancy  had  produced  two  effects : the 
lengthening  of  the  care  of  children  tended  to  dif- 
ferentiate the  horde  into  family-groups,  and  the 
lengthening  of  the  period  of  youthful  mental  plas- 
ticity made  it  more  possible  for  a new  generation 
to  improve  upon  the  ideas  and  customs  of  its  pre- 
decessors.1 In  these  two  concomitant  processes 
— the  development  of  the  family  and  the  increase 
of  mental  plasticity,  or  ability  to  adopt  new  meth- 
ods and  strike  out  into  new  paths  of  thought  — lies 
the  whole  explanation  of  the  moral  and  intellectual 
superiority  of  men  over  dumb  animals.  But  in 
each  case  the  change  was  very  gradual.2  The  true 
savage  is  only  a little  less  unteachable  than  the 
beasts  of  the  field.  The  savage  family  is  at  first 
barely  discernible  amid  the  primitive  social  chaos 

so  far  as  concerns  the  origin  of  Man,  for  the  nation  is  a still  more 
modem  institution  than  the  family  ; but  in  the  other  items  of  his 
statement  he  was  right,  and  as  regards  the  human  race  he  was 
thinking  in  the  right  direction  when  he  placed  multitude  instead 
of  duality  at  the  beginning.  If  instead  of  that  extremely  com- 
plex and  highly  organized  multitude  called  “ nation  ” (in  the  plu- 
ral), he  had  started  with  the  extremely  simple  and  almost  unor- 
ganized multitude  called  “horde”  (in  the  singular),  the  state- 
ment for  Man  would  have  been  correct.  Such  views  were  hardly 
within  the  reach  of  science  thirty  years  ago. 

1 Outlines  of  Cosmic  Philosophy , part  ii.,  chaps,  xvi.,  xxi.,  xxii. ; 
Excursions  of  an  Evolutionist , pp.  306-319 ; Darwinism , and  other 
Essays , pp.  40-49 ; The  Destiny  of  Man , §§  iii.-ix. 

2 The  slowness  of  the  development  has  apparently  been  such 
as  befits  the  transcendent  value  of  the  result.  Though  the  ques- 
tion is  confessedly  beyond  the  reach  of  science,  may  we  not  hold 
that  civilized  man,  the  creature  of  an  infinite  past,  is  the  child  of 
eternity,  maturing  for  an  inheritance  of  immortal  life  ? 


60 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


in  which,  it  had  its  origin.  Along  with  polyandry 
and  polygyny  in  various  degrees  and  forms,  in- 
stances of  exclusive  pairing,  of  at  least  a tempo- 
rary character,  are  to  be  found  among  the  lowest 
existing  savages,  and  there  are  reasons 

Earliest  fam-  „ ° . ° , , - _ 

iiy-group : the  tor  supposing  that  such  may  have  been 
the  case  even  in  primeval  times.  But 
it  was  impossible  for  strict  monogamy  to  flourish 
in  the  ruder  stages  of  social  development;  and 
the  kind  of  family-group  that  was  first  clearly 
and  permanently  differentiated  from  the  primeval 
horde  was  not  at  all  like  what  civilized  people 
would  recognize  as  a family.  It  was  the  gens  or 
clan , as  we  find  it  exemplified  in  all  stages  from 
the  middle  period  of  savagery  to  the  middle  pe- 
riod of  barbarism.  The  gens  or  clan  was  simply 
— - to  define  it  by  a third  synonym  — the  kin  ; it 
was  originally  a group  of  males  and  females  who 
were  traditionally  aware  of  their  common  descent 
reckoned  in  the  female  line.  At  this 
stage  of  development  there  was  quite 
generally  though  not  universally  prevalent  the  cus- 
tom of  “ exogamy,”  by  which  a man  was  forbid- 
den to  marry  a woman  of  his  own  clan.  Among 
such  Australian  tribes  as  have  been  studied,  this 
primitive  restriction  upon  promiscuity  seems  to  be 
about  the  only  one. 

Throughout  all  the  earlier  stages  of  culture, 
and  even  into  the  civilized  period,  we  find  society 
organized  with  the  clan  for  its  ultimate  unit,  al- 
though in  course  of  time  its  character  becomes 
greatly  altered  by  the  substitution  of  kinship  in 
the  paternal,  for  that  in  the  maternal  line.  By 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  01 

long-continued  growth  and  repeated  segmentation 
the  primitive  clan  was  developed  into  a p^try  and 
more  complex  structure,  in  which  a tribe' 
group  of  clans  constituted  a phratry  or  brother- 
hood, and  a group  of  phratries  constituted  a tribe. 
This  threefold  grouping  is  found  so  commonly  in 
all  parts  of  the  world  as  to  afford  good  ground 
for  the  belief  that  it  has  been  universal.  It  was 
long  ago  familiar  to  historians  in  the  case  of 
Greece  and  Rome,  and  of  our  Teutonic  forefathers,1 
but  it  also  existed  generally  in  ancient  America, 
and  many  obscure  points  connected  with  the  his- 
tory of  the  Greek  and  Roman  groups  have  been 
elucidated  through  the  study  of  Iroquois  and  Al- 
gonquin institutions.  Along  with  the  likenesses, 
however,  there  are  numerous  unlikenesses,  due  to 
the  change  of  kinship,  among  the  European 
groups,  from  the  female  line  to  the  male. 

This  change,  as  it  occurred  among  Aryan  and 
Semitic  peoples,  marked  one  of  the  most  momen- 
tous revolutions  in  the  history  of  mankind.  It 
probably  occurred  early  in  the  upper  period  of 
barbarism,  or  late  in  the  middle  period,  after  the 
long-continued  domestication  of  animals  had  re- 
sulted in  the  acquisition  of  private  property  ( pe - 
cus , peculium , pecunia ) in  large  amounts  by  in- 
dividuals. In  primitive  society  there 
was  very  little  personal  property  ex-  torafufe  Spon 
cept  in  weapons,  clothing  (such  as  it  upon  the  fam- 
was),  and  trinkets.  Real  estate  was  un- 
known. Land  was  simply  occupied  by  the  tribe. 
There  was  general  communism  and  social  equal- 

1 The  Teutonic  hundred  and  Roman  curia  answered  to  the 
Greek  phratry. 


62 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


ity.  In  the  Old  World  the  earliest  instance  of 
extensive  “ adverse  possession  ” on  the  part  of  in- 
dividuals, as  against  other  individuals  in  the  clan- 
community,  was  the  possession  of  flocks  and  herds. 
Distinctions  in  wealth  and  rank  were  thus  inaugu- 
rated ; slavery  began  to  be  profitable  and  personal 
retainers  and  adherents  useful  in  new  ways.  As 
in  earlier  stages  the  community  in  marital  rela- 
tions had  been  part  of  the  general  community  in 
possessions,  so  now  the  exclusive  possession  of  a 
wife  or  wives  was  part  of  the  system  of  private 
property  that  was  coming  into  vogue.  The  man 
of  many  cattle,  the  man  who  could  attach  subor- 
dinates to  him  through  motives  of  self-interest  as 
well  as  personal  deference,  the  man  who  could  de- 
fend his  property  against  robbers,  could  also  have 
his  separate  household  and  maintain  its  sanctity. 
In  this  way,  it  is  believed,  indissoluble  marriage, 
in  its  two  forms  of  monogamy  and  polygamy, 
originated.  That  it  had  already  existed  sporadi- 
cally is  not  denied,  but  it  now  acquired  such  sta- 
bility and  permanence  that  the  older  and  looser 
forms  of  alliance,  hitherto  prevalent,  fell  into  dis- 
favour, A natural  result  of  the  growth  of  private 
wealth  and  the  permanence  of  the  marital  rela- 
tion was  the  change  in  reckoning  kinship  from  the 
maternal  to  the  paternal  line.  This  change  was 
probably  favoured  by  the  prevalence  of  polygamy 
among  those  who  were  coming  to  be  distinguished 
as  “upper  classes,”  since  a large  family  of  chil- 
dren by  different  mothers  could  be  held  together 
only  by  reckoning  the  kinship  through  the  father. 
Thus,  we  may  suppose,  originated  the  patriarchal 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


63 


family.  Even  in  its  rudest  form  it  was  an  im- 
mense improvement  upon  what  had  gone  before, 
and  to  the  stronger  and  higher  social  organization 
thus  acquired  we  must  largely  ascribe  the  rise  of 
the  Aryan  and  Semitic  peoples  to  the  foremost 
rank  of  civilization.1 

It  is  not  intended  to  imply  that  there  is  no 
other  way  in  which  the  change  to  the  male  line 
may  have  been  brought  about  among  other  peo- 
ples. The  explanation  just  given  applies  very 
well  to  the  Aryan  and  Semitic  peoples,  but  it  is 
inapplicable  to  the  state  of  things  which  seems  to 
have  existed  in  Mexico  at  the  time  of  the  Dis- 
covery.2 The  subject  is  a difficult  one,  and  some- 
times confronts  us  with  questions  much  easier  to 
ask  than  to  answer.  The  change  has  been  ob- 
served among  tribes  in  a lower  stage  than  that 
just  described.3  On  the  other  hand,  as  old  cus- 
toms die  hard,  no  doubt  inheritance  has  in  many 
places  continued  in  the  maternal  line  long  after 
paternity  is  fully  known.  Symmetrical  regularity 
in  the  development  of  human  institutions  has  by 
no  means  been  the  rule,  and  there  is  often  much 
difficulty  in  explaining  particular  cases,  even  when 
the  direction  of  the  general  drift  can  be  discerned. 

1 Fenton’s  Early  Hebrew  Life , London,  1880,  is  an  interesting 
study  of  the  upper  period  of  barbarism ; see  also  Spencer,  Prin- 
cip.  of  Sociol.,  i.  724-737. 

2 See  below,  p.  122. 

8 As  among  the  Hervey  Islanders;  Gill, Myths  and  Songs  of  the 
South  Pacific , p.  36.  Sir  John  Lubbock  would  account  for  the 
curious  and  widely  spread  custom  of  the  Couvade  as  a feature  of 
this  change.  Origin  of  Civilization , pp.  14-17,  159 ; cf.  Tylor, 
Early  Hist,  of  Mankind,  pp.  288,  297. 


64 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


In  aboriginal  America,  as  already  observed, 
kinship  through  females  only  was  the  rule,  and 
The  exoga-  exogamy  was  strictly  enforced,  — the 
SentAmer-  wife  must  be  taken  from  a different 
lca>  clan.  Indissoluble  marriage,  whether 

monogamous  or  polygamous,  seems  to  have  been 
unknown.  The  marriage  relation  was  terminable 
at  the  will  of  either  party.1  The  abiding  unit 
upon  which  the  social  structure  was  founded  was 
not  the  family  but  the  exogamous  clan. 

I have  been  at  some  pains  to  elucidate  this 
point  because  the  house -life  of  the  American 
aborigines  found  visible,  and  in  some  instances 
very  durable,  expression  in  a remarkable  style  of 
house-architecture.  The  manner  in  which  the  In- 
dians built  their  houses  grew  directly  out  of  the 
requirements  of  their  life.  It  was  an  unmistak- 
ably characteristic  architecture,  and  while  it  ex- 

1 “ There  is  no  embarrassment  growing  out  of  problems  re- 
specting the  woman’s  future  support,  the  division  of  property,  or 
the  adjustment  of  claims  for  the  possession  of  the  children.  The 
independent  self-support  of  every  adult  healthy  Indian,  male  or 
female,  and  the  gentile  relationship,  which  is  more  wide-reaching 
and  authoritative  than  that  of  marriage,  have  already  disposed  of 
these  questions,  which  are  usually  so  perplexing  for  the  white 
man.  So  far  as  personal  maintenance  is  concerned,  a woman  is, 
as  a rule,  just  as  well  off  without  a husband  as  with  one.  What 
is  hers,  in  the  shape  of  property,  remains  her  own  whether  she  is 
married  or  not.  In  fact,  marriage  among  these  Indians  seems  to 
be  but  the  natural  mating  of  the  sexes,  to  cease  at  the  option  of 
either  of  the  interested  parties.”  Clay  MaeCauley,  “ The  Semi- 
nole Indians  of  Florida,”  in  Fifth  Annual  Report  of  the  Bureau  of 
Ethnology , Washington,  1887,  p.  497.  For  a graphic  account  of 
the  state,  of  things  among  the  Cheyennes  and  Arrapahos,  see 
Dodge,  Our  Wild  Indians , pp.  204-220. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  65 

hibits  manifold  unlikenesses  in  detail,  due  to  dif- 
ferences in  intelligence  as  well  as  to 

° Intimate  con- 

the  presence  or  absence  of  sundry  mar  nection  of  ab- 

r m , J , original  arcbi- 

terials,  there  is  one  underlying  princi- 
pie  always  manifest.  That  underlying 
principle  is  adaptation  to  a certain  mode  of  com- 
munal living  such  as  all  American  aborigines  that 
have  been  carefully  studied  are  known  to  have 
practised.  Through  many  gradations,  from  the 
sty  of  the  California  savage  up  to  the  noble  sculp- 
tured ruins  of  Uxmal  and  Chichen-Itza,  the  prin- 
ciple is  always  present.  Taken  in  connection  with 
evidence  from  other  sources,  it  enables  us  to  ex- 
hibit a gradation  of  stages  of  culture  in  aboriginal 
North  America,  with  the  savages  of  the  Sacra- 
mento and  Columbia  valleys  at  the  bottom,  and  the 
Mayas  of  Yucatan  at  the  top ; and  while  in  going 
from  one  end  to  the  other  a very  long  interval  was 
traversed,  we  feel  that  the  progress  of  the  abori- 
gines in  crossing  that  interval  was  made  along 
similar  lines.1 

The  principle  was  first  studied  and  explained  by 
Mr.  Morgan  in  the  case  of  the  famous  “long 
houses  ” of  the  Iroquois.  “ The  long  house  . . . 
was  from  fifty  to  eighty  and  sometimes  one  hun- 
dred feet  long.  It  consisted  of  a strong  frame 
of  upright  poles  set  in  the  ground,  which  was 
strengthened  with  horizontal  poles  attached  with 
withes,  and  surmounted  with  a triangular,  and  in 
some  cases  with  a round  roof.  It  was  covered  over, 

1 See  Morgan’s  Houses  and  House-Life  of  the  American  Abori- 
gines, Washington,  1881,  an  epoch-making  book  of  rare  and  ab- 
sorbing interest. 


66 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


both  sides  and  roof,  with  long  strips  of  elm  bark 
tied  to  the  frame  with  strings  or  splints.  An  ex- 


Seneca-Iroquois  long’  house. 

ternal  frame  of  poles  for  the  sides  and  of  rafters 
The  long  f°r  the  roof  were  then  adjusted  to  hold 
houses  of  the  the  bark  shingles  between  them,  the 
two  frames  being  tied  together.  The 
interior  of  the  house  was  comparted  1 at  intervals 


L 1 
* « 

! 1 

i 

V. 

U 

i 1 

i 

u 

n 

i i 

n 

i i 

1 I 
1* 

M 

n 

L.l 

! 1 

n 

1 

n 

u 

n 

i 

u 

n 

i 

u 

96 

rr. 

Ground-plan  of  long  house. 


of  six  or  eight  feet,  leaving  each  chamber  entirely 
open  like  a stall  upon  the  passageway  which 
passed  through  the  centre  of  the  house  from  end 
to  end.  At  each  end  was  a doorway  covered  with 
suspended  skins.  Between  each  four  apartments, 
two  on  a side,  was  a fire-pit  in  the  centre  of  the 
hall,  used  in  common  by  their  occupants.  Thus  a 
house  with  five  fires  would  contain  twenty  apart- 


1 This  verb  of  Mr.  Morgan’s  at  first  struck  me  as  odd,  hut 
though  rarely  used,  it  is  supported  by  good  authority ; see  Cen- 
tury Dictionary,  s.  v. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


67 


merits  and  accommodate  twenty  families,  unless 
some  apartments  were  reserved  for  storage.  They 
were  warm,  roomy,  and  tidily-kept  habitations. 
Raised  bunks  were  constructed  around  the  walls 
of  each  apartment  for  beds.  From  the  roof-poles 
were  suspended  their  strings  of  corn  in  the  ear, 
braided  by  the  husks,  also  strings  of  dried  squashes 
and  pumpkins.  Spaces  were  contrived  here  and 
there  to  store  away  their  accumulations  of  provi- 
sions. Each  house,  as  a rule,  was  occupied  by  re- 
lated families,  the  mothers  and  their  children  be- 
longing to  the  same  gens,  while  their  husbands 
and  the  fathers  of  these  children  belonged  to  other 
gentes ; consequently  the  gens  or  clan  of  the 
mother  largely  predominated  in  the  household. 
Whatever  was  taken  in  the  hunt  or  raised  by  cul- 
tivation by  any  member  of  the  household  . . . 
was  for  the  common  benefit.  Provisions  were 
made  a common  stock  within  the  household.”  1 
“ Over  every  such  household  a matron  presided, 
whose  duty  it  was  to  supervise  its  domestic  econ- 
omy. After  the  single  daily  meal  had  been  cooked 
at  the  different  fires  within  the  house,  it  was  her 
province  to  divide  the  food  from  the  kettle  to  the 
several  families  according  to  their  respective  needs. 
What  remained  was  placed  in  the  custody  of  an- 
other person  until  she  again  required  it.”  2 

1 The  Iroquois  ceased  to  build  such  houses  before  the  begin- 
ning of  the  present  century.  I quote  Mr.  Morgan’s  description 
at  length,  because  his  book  is  out  of  print  and  hard  to  obtain. 
It  ought  to  be  republished,  and  in  octavo,  like  his  Ancient  So- 
ciety, of  which  it  is  a continuation. 

2 Lucien  Carr,  “ On  the  Social  and  Political  Position  of  Woman 
among  the  Huron-Iroquois  Tribes,”  Reports  of  Peabody  Museum , 
vol.  iii.  p.  215. 


68 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


Summary 

divorce. 


Not  only  the  food  was  common  property,  hut 
many  chattels,  including  the  children,  belonged  to 
the  gens  or  clan.  When  a young  woman  got  mar- 
ried she  brought  her  husband  home  with  her. 
Though  thenceforth  an  inmate  of  this  household 
he  remained  an  alien  to  her  clan.  “ If  he  proved 
lazy  and  failed  to  do  his  share  of  the  providing, 
woe  be  to  him.  No  matter  how  many  children,  or 
whatever  goods  he  might  have  in  the  house,  he 
might  at  any  time  be  ordered  to  pick 
up  his  blanket  and  budge;  and  after 
such  orders  it  would  not  be  healthful  for  him  to 
disobey ; the  house  would  be  too  hot  for  him ; and 
unless  saved  by  the  intercession  of  some  aunt  or 
grandmother  [of  his  wife]  he  must  retreat  to  his 
own  clan,  or,  as  was  often  done,  go  and  start  a 
new  matrimonial  alliance  in  some  other.  . . . The 
female  portion  ruled  the  house.” 1 

Though  there  was  but  one  freshly-cooked  meal, 
taken  about  the  middle  of  the  day,  any  member  of 
the  household  when  hungry  could  be  helped  from 
the  common  stock.  Hospitality  was  universal.  If 
a person  from  one  of  the  other  communal  house- 
holds, or  a stranger  from  another  tribe  (in  time  of 
peace),  were  to  visit  the  house,  the  women  would 
immediately  offer  him  food,  and  it  was 
a breach  of  etiquette  to  decline  to  eat  it. 
This  custom  was  strictly  observed  all  over  the 
continent  and  in  the  West  India  Islands,  and  was 
often  remarked  upon  by  the  early  discoverers,  in 


Hospitality. 


1 This  was  not  incompatible  with  the  subjection  of  women  to 
extreme  drudgery  and  ill-treatment.  For  an  instructive  compari- 
son with  the  ease  among  the  tribes  of  the  Far  West,  see  Dodge, 
Our  Wild  Indians , chap.  xvi. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


69 


whose  minds  it  was  apt  to  implant  idyllic  notions 
that  were  afterward  rudely  disturbed.  The  prev- 
alence of  hospitality  among  uncivilized  races  has 
long  been  noted  by  travellers,  and  is  probably  in 
most  cases,  as  it  certainly  was  in  ancient  America, 
closely  connected  with  communism  in  living. 

The  clan,  which  practised  this  communism,  had 
its  definite  organization,  officers,  rights,  and  duties. 
Its  official  head  was  the  “sachem,”  whose  func- 
tions were  of  a civil  nature.  The  sachem  was 
elected  by  the  clan  and  must  be  a member  of  it, 
so  that  a son  could  not  be  chosen  to  succeed  his 
father,  but  a sachem  could  be  succeeded  structure  of 
by  his  uterine  brother  or  by  his  sister’s  the  cUn' 
son,  and  in  this  way  customary  lines  of  succession 
could  and  often  did  tend  to  become  established. 
The  clan  also  elected  its  “ chiefs,”  whose  functions 
were  military ; the  number  of  chiefs  was  propor- 
tionate to  that  of  the  people  composing  the  clan, 
usually  one  chief  to  every  fifty  or  sixty  persons. 
The  clan  could  depose  its  sachem  or  any  of  its 
chiefs.  Personal  property,  such  as  weapons,  or 
trophies,  or  rights  of  user  in  the  garden-plots,  was 
inheritable  in  the  female  line,  and  thus  stayed 
within  the  clan.  The  members  were  reciprocally 
bound  to  help,  defend,  and  avenge  one  another. 
The  clan  had  the  right  of  adopting  strangers  to 
strengthen  itself.  It  had  the  right  of  naming  its 
members,  and  these  names  were  always  obviously 
significant,  like  Little  Turtle,  Yellow  Wolf,  etc.; 
of  names  like  our  Richard  or  William,  with  the 
meaning  lost,  or  obvious  only  to  scholars,  no  trace 
is  to  be  found  in  aboriginal  America.  The  clan 


70 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


itself,  too,  always  had  a name,  which  was  usually 
that  of  some  animal,  — as  Wolf,  Eagle,  or  Salmon, 
and  a rude  drawing  or  pictograph  of  the  creature 
served  as  a “ totem  ” or  primitive  heraldic  device. 
A mythological  meaning  was  attached  to  this  em- 
blem. The  clan  had  its  own  common  religious 
rites  and  common  burial  place.  There  was  a clan- 
council,  of  which  women  might  be  members ; there 
were  instances,  indeed,  of  its  being  composed  en- 
tirely of  women,  whose  position  was  one  of  much 
more  dignity  and  influence  than  has  commonly 
been  supposed.  Instances  of  squaw  sachems  were 
not  so  very  rare.1 

The  number  of  clans  in  a tribe  naturally  bore 
some  proportion  to  the  populousness  of  the  tribe, 
varying  from  three,  in  the  case  of  the  Delawares, 
to  twenty  or  more,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Ojibwas 
and  Creeks.  There  were  usually  eight  or  ten,  and 
these  were  usually  grouped  into  two  or  three  phra- 
origin  and  tries.  The  phratry  seems  to  have  origi- 
— eof  nated  in  the  segmentation  of  the  over- 

grown clan,  for  in  some  cases  exogamy 
was  originally  practised  as  between  the  phratries 
and  afterward  the  custom  died  out  while  it  was 
retained  as  between  their  constituent  clans.2  The 

1 Among  the  Wyandots  there  is  in  each  clan  a council  com- 
posed of  four  squaws,  and  this  council  elects  the  male  sachem  who 
is  its  head.  Therefore  the  tribal  council,  which  is  the  aggregate 
of  the  clan-councils,  consists  one  fifth  of  men  and  four  fifths  of 
women.  See  Powell,  “ Wyandot  Government : a Short  Study  of 
Tribal  Society,”  in  First  Annual  Report  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnol- 
ogy , Washington,  1881,  pp.  59-69  ; and  also  Mr.  Carr’s  interesting 
essay  above  cited. 

2 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Native  Races  of  the  Pacific  States , vol.  i.  p. 
109. 


i 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


71 


system  of  naming  often  indicates  this  origin  of 
the  phratry,  though  seldom  quite  so  forcibly  as  in 
the  case  of  the  Mohegan  tribe,  Which  was  thus 
composed : 1 — 

I.  Wolf  Phratry. 

Clans : 1.  Wolf,  2.  Bear,  3.  Dog,  4.  Opossum. 

II.  Turtle  Phratry. 

Clans : 5.  Little  Turtle,  6.  Mud  Turtle,  7.  Great 
Turtle,  8.  Yellow  Eel. 

III.  Turkey  Phratry. 

Clans : 9.  Turkey,  10.  Crane,  11.  Chicken. 

Here  the  senior  clan  in  the  phratry  tends  to  keep 
the  original  clan-name,  while  the  junior  clans  have 
been  guided  by  a sense  of  kinship  in  choosing  their 
new  names.  This  origin  of  the  phratry  is  further 
indicated  by  the  fact  that  the  phratry  does  not  al- 
ways occur ; sometimes  the  clans  are  organized  di- 
rectly into  the  tribe.  The  phratry  was  not  so  much 
a governmental  as  a religious  and  social  organiza- 
tion. Its  most  important  function  seems  to  have 
been  supplementing  or  reinforcing  the  action  of  the 
single  clan  in  exacting  compensation  for  murder ; 
and  this  point  is  full  of  interest  because  it  helps  us 
to  understand  how  among  our  Teutonic  forefathers 
the  “ hundred  ” (the  equivalent  of  the  phratry) 
became  charged  with  the  duty  of  prosecuting 
criminals.  The  Greek  phratry  had  a precisely 
analogous  function.2 

1 Morgan,  Houses  and  House-Life,  p.  16. 

2 See  Freeman,  Comparative  Politics,  p.  117 ; Stubbs,  Const. 


72 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  Indian  tribe  was  a group  of  people  distin- 
guished by  the  exclusive  possession  of  a dialect  in 
common.  It  possessed  a tribal  name  and  occupied 
structure  of  a more  or  less  clearly  defined  territory ; 
the  tnbe.  there  were  also  tribal  religious  rites. 
Its  supreme  government  was  vested  in  the  council 
of  its  clan-chiefs  and  sachems  ; and  as  these  were 
thus  officers  of  the  tribe  as  well  as  of  the  clan,  the 
tribe  exercised  the  right  of  investing  them  with 
office,  amid  appropriate  solemnities,  after  their 
election  by  their  respective  clans.  The  tribal- 
council  had  also  the  right  to  depose  chiefs  and 
sachems.  In  some  instances,  not  always,  there 
was  a head  chief  or  military  commander  for  the 
tribes,  elected  by  the  tribal  council.  Such  was 
the  origin  of  the  office  which,  in  most  societies  of 
the  Old  World,  gradually  multiplied  its  functions 
and  accumulated  power  until  it  developed  into 
true  kingship.  Nowhere  in  ancient  North  America 
did  it  quite  reach  such  a stage. 

Among  the  greater  part  of  the  aborigines  no 
higher  form  of  social  structure  was  attained  than 
the  tribe.  There  were,  however,  several  instances 
Cross-relation-  of  permanent  confederation,  of  which 
cfans  andWeen  the  two  most  interesting  and  most 
niJquoJcon-  highly  developed  were  the  League  of 
federacy.  the  Iroquois,  mentioned  above,  and  the 
Mexican  Confederacy,  presently  to  be  considered. 
The  principles  upon  which  the  Iroquois  league 


Hist.,  vol.  i.  pp.  98-104;  Grote,  History  of  Greece,  vol.  iii.  pp.  74, 
88.  It  is  interesting  to  compare  Grote’ s description  with  Mor- 
gan’s (Anc.  Soc.,  pp.  71,  94)  and  note  both  the  closeness  of  the 
general  parallelism  and  the  character  of  the  specific  variations. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


73 


was  founded  have  been  thoroughly  and  minutely 
explained  by  Mr.  Morgan.1  It  originated  in  a 
union  of  five  tribes  composed  of  clans  in  common, 
and  speaking  five  dialects  of  a common  language. 
These  tribes  had  themselves  arisen  through  the 
segmentation  of  a single  overgrown  tribe,  so  that 
portions  of  the  original  clans  survived  in  them  all. 
The  Wolf,  Bear,  and  Turtle  clan  were  common  to 
all  the  five  tribes ; three  other  clans  were  common 
to  three  of  the  five.  “ All  the  members  of  the 
same  gens  [clan],  whether  Mohawks,  Oneidas, 
Onondagas,  Cayugas,  or  Senecas,  were  brothers 
and  sisters  to  each  other  in  virtue  of  their  descent 
from  the  same  common  [female]  ancestor,  and 
they  recognized  each  other  as  such  with  the  full- 
est cordiality.  When  they  met,  the  first  inquiry 
was  the  name  of  each  other’s  gens,  and  next  the 
immediate  pedigree  of  each  other’s  sachems ; after 
which  they  were  able  to  find,  under  their  peculiar 
system  of  consanguinity,  the  relationship  in  which 
they  stood  to  each  other.  . . . This  cross-relation- 
ship between  persons  of  the  same  gens  in  the  dif- 
ferent tribes  is  still  preserved  and  recognized 
among  them  in  all  its  original  force.  It  explains 
the  tenacity  with  which  the  fragments  of  the  old 
confederacy  still  cling  together.”  2 Acknowledged 

1 In  his  League  of  the  Iroquois , Rochester,  1861,  a hook  now 
out  of  print  and  excessively  rare.  A brief  summary  is  given  in 
his  Ancient  Society,  chap,  v.,  and  in  his  Houses  and  House-Life, 
pp.  23-41.  Mr.  Morgan  was  adopted  into  the  Seneca  tribe,  and 
his  life  work  was  begun  by  a profound  and  exhaustive  study  of 
this  interesting  people. 

2 Houses  and  House-Life,  p.  33.  At  the  period  of  its  greatest 
power,  about  1675,  the  people  of  the  confederacy  were  about 
25,000  in  number.  In  1875,  according  to  official  statistics  (see 


74 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


consanguinity  is  to  the  barbarian  a sound  reason, 
and  the  only  one  conceivable,  for  permanent  po- 
litical union ; and  the  very  existence  of  such  a 
confederacy  as  that  of  the  Five  Nations  was  ren- 
dered possible  only  through  the  permanence  of 
the  clans  or  communal  households  which  were  its 
ultimate  units.  We  have  here  a clue  to  the  policy 
of  these  Indians  toward  the  kindred  tribes  who 
refused  to  join  their  league.  These  tribes,  too,  so 
far  as  is  known,  would  seem  to  have  contained  the 
same  clans.  After  a separation  of  at  least  four 
hundred  years  the  Wyandots  have  still  five  of 
their  eight  clans  in  common  with  the  Iroquois. 
When  the  Eries  and  other  tribes  would  not  join 
the  league  of  their  kindred,  the  refusal  smacked 
of  treason  to  the  kin,  and  we  can  quite  understand 
the  deadly  fury  with  which  the  latter  turned  upon 
them  and  butchered  every  man,  woman,  and  child 
except  such  as  they  saw  fit  to  adopt  into  their  own 
clans. 

table  appended  to  Dodge’s  Plains  of  the  Great  West , pp.  441- 
448),  there  were  in  the  state  of  New  York  198  Oneidas,  203 
Onondagas,  165  Cayugas,  3,043  Senecas,  and  448  Tuscaroras,  — in 
all  4,057.  Besides  these  there  were  1,279  Oneidas  on  a reservation 
in  Wisconsin,  and  207  Senecas  in  the  Indian  Territory.  The  Mo- 
hawks are  not  mentioned  in  the  list.  During  the  Revolutionary 
War,  and  just  afterward,  the  Mohawks  migrated  into  Upper  Can- 
ada (Ontario),  for  an  account  of  which  the  reader  may  consult 
the  second  volume  of  Stone’s  Life  of  Brant.  Portions  of  the 
other  tribes  also  went  to  Canada.  In  New  York  the  Oneidas  and 
Tuscaroras  were  converted  to  Christianity  by  Samuel  Kirkland 
and  withheld  from  alliance  with  the  British  during  the  Revolu- 
tion ; the  others  still  retain  their  ancient  religion.  They  are  for 
the  most  part  farmers  and  are  now  increasing  in  numbers.  Their 
treatment  by  the  state  of  New  York  has  been  honourably  distin- 
guished for  justice  and  humanity. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA . 


75 


Each  of  the  Five  Tribes  retained  its  local  self- 
government.  The  supreme  government  of  the  con- 
federacy was  vested  in  a General  Council  of  fifty 
sachems,  “ equal  in  rank  and  authority.”  The  fifty 
sachemships  were  created  in  perpetuity  in  certain 
clans  of  the  several  tribes;  whenever  a vacancy 
occurred,  it  was  filled  by  the  clan  electing  one  of 
its  own  members ; a sachem  once  thus  elected 
could  be  deposed  by  the  clan-council  for 
good  cause ; “ but  the  right  to  invest  the  confed- 
these  sachems  with  office  was  reserved  eracy' 
to  the  General  Council.”  These  fifty  sachems  of 
the  confederacy  were  likewise  sachems  in  their 
respective  tribes,  “and  with  the  chiefs  of  these 
tribes  formed  the  council  of  each,  which  was  su- 
preme over  all  matters  pertaining  to  the  tribe  ex- 
clusively.” The  General  Council  could  not  con- 
vene itself,  but  could  be  convened  by  any  one  of 
the  five  tribal  councils.  The  regular  meeting  was 
once  a year  in  the  autumn,  in  the  valley  of  Onon- 
daga, but  in  stirring  times  extra  sessions  were  fre- 
quent. The  proceedings  were  opened  by  an  ad- 
dress from  one  of  the  sachems,  “ in  the  course  of 
which  he  thanked  the  Great  Spirit  [i.  e.  Ioskeha, 
the  sky-god]  for  sparing  their  lives  and  permit- 
ting them  to  meet  together  ; ” after  this  they  were 
ready  for  business.  It  was  proper  for  any  orator 
from  among  the  people  to  address  the  Council 
with  arguments,  and  the  debates  were  sometimes 
very  long  and  elaborate.  When  it  came  to  vot- 
ing, the  fifty  sachems  voted  by  tribes,  each  tribe 
counting  as  a unit,  and  unanimity  was  as  impera- 
tive as  in  an  English  jury,  so  that  one  tribe  could 


76 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


block  the  proceedings.  The  confederacy  had  no 
head-sachem,  or  civil  chief-magistrate ; but  a mili- 
tary commander  was  indispensable,  and,  curiously 
enough,  without  being  taught  by  the  experience  of 
a Tarquin,  the  Iroquois  made  this  a dual  office, 
like  the  Roman  consulship.  There  were  two  per- 
manent chieftainships,  one  in  the  Wolf,  the  other 
in  the  Turtle  clan,  and  both  in  the  Seneca  tribe, 
because  the  western  border  was  the  most  exposed 
to  attack.1  The  chiefs  were  elected  by  the  clan, 
and  inducted  into  office  by  the  General  Council ; 
their  tenure  was  during  life  or  good  behaviour. 
This  office  never  encroached  upon  the  others  in  its 
powers,  but  an  able  warrior  in  this  position  could 
wield  great  influence. 

Such  was  the  famous  confederacy  of  the  Iro- 
quois. They  called  it  the  Long  House,  and  by 
The  “Long  this  name  as  commonly  as  any  other  it 

House.”  is  known  in  history.  The  name  by 

which  they  called  themselves  was  Hodenosaunee, 
or  “ People  of  the  Long  House.”  The  name  was 
picturesquely  descriptive  of  the  long  and  narrow 
strip  of  villages  with  its  western  outlook  toward 
the  Niagara,  and  its  eastern  toward  the  Hudson, 
three  hundred  miles  distant.  But  it  was  appro- 
priate also  for  another  and  a deeper  reason  than 
this.  We  have  seen  that  in  its  social  and  political 

1 Somewhat  on  the  same  principle  that  in  mediaeval  Europe 
led  an  earl  or  count,  commanding  an  exposed  border  district  or 
march  to  rise  in  power  and  importance  and  become  a “ margrave  ” 
\marh -j- graf  — march-count]  or  “marquis.”  Compare  the  in- 
crease of  sovereignty  accorded  to  the  earls  of  Chester  and  bishops 
of  Durham  as  rulers  of  the  two  principal  march  counties  of  Eng- 
land. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


77 


structure,  from  top  to  bottom  and  from  end  to 
end,  the  confederacy  was  based  upon  and  held  to- 
gether by  the  gentes,  clans,  communal  households, 
or  “ long  houses,”  which  were  its  component  units. 
They  may  be  compared  to  the  hypothetical  inde- 
structible atoms  of  modem  physics,  whereof  all 
material  objects  are  composed.  The  whole  insti- 
tutional fabric  was  the  outgrowth  of  the  group  of 
ideas  and  habits  that  belong  to  a state  of  society 
ignorant  of  and  incapable  of  imagining  any  other 
form  of  organization  than  the  clan  held  together 
by  the  tie  of  a common  maternal  ancestry.  The 
house  architecture  was  as  much  a constituent  part 
of  the  fabric  as  the  council  of  sachems.  There  is 
a transparency  about  the  system  that  is  very  dif- 
ferent from  the  obscurity  we  continually  find  in 
Europe  and  Asia,  where  different  strata  of  ideas 
and  institutions  have  been  superimposed  one  upon 
another  and  crumpled  and  distorted  with  as  little 
apparent  significance  or  purpose  as  the  porches 
and  gables  of  a so-called  “ Queen  Anne  ” house.1 
Conquest  in  the  Old  World  has  resulted  in  the 
commingling  and  manifold  fusion  of  peoples  in 
very  different  stages  of  development.  In  the  New 
World  there  has  been  very  little  of  that  sort  of 
thing.  Conquest  in  ancient  America  was  pretty 
much  all  of  the  Iroquois  type,  entailing  in  its 
milder  form  the  imposition  of  tribute,  in  its  more 
desperate  form  the  extermination  of  a tribe  with 
the  adoption  of  its  remnants  into  the  similarly- 

1 For  instance,  the  whole  discussion  in  Gomme’s  Village  Com- 
munity, London,  1890,  an  excellent  book,  abounds  with  instances 
of  this  crumpling. 


78 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


contituted  tribe  of  the  conquerors.  There  was 
therefore  but  little  modification  of  the  social  struc- 
ture while  the  people,  gradually  acquiring  new 
arts,  were  passing  through  savagery  and  into  a 
more  or  less  advanced  stage  of  barbarism.  The 
symmetry  of  the  structure  and  the  relation  of 
one  institution  to  another  is  thus  distinctly  ap- 
parent. 

The  communal  household  and  the  political  struc- 
ture built  upon  it,  as  above  described  in  the  case 
of  the  Iroquois,  seem  to  have  existed  all  over  an- 
cient North  America,  with  agreement  in  funda- 
mental characteristics  and  variation  in  details  and 
degree  of  development.  There  are  many  corners 
as  yet  imperfectly  explored,  but  hitherto,  in  so  far 
as  research  has  been  rewarded  with  information,  it 
all  points  in  the  same  general  direction.  Among 
the  tribes  above  enumerated  as  either  in  savagery 
or  in  the  lower  status  of  barbarism,  so  far  as  they 
have  been  studied,  there  seems  to  be  a general 
agreement,  as  to  the  looseness  of  the  marriage 
tie,  the  clan  with  descent  in  the  female  line,  the 
phratry,  the  tribe,  the  officers  and  councils,  the 
social  equality,  the  community  in  goods  (with  ex- 
ceptions already  noted),  and  the  wigwam  or  house 
adapted  to  communal  living. 

The  extreme  of  variation  consistent  with  adher- 
ence to  the  common  principle  was  to  be  found  in 
the  shape  and  material  of  the  houses.  Those  of 
the  savage  tribes  were  but  sorry  huts.  The  long 
house  was  used  by  the  Powhatans  and  other  Al- 
gonquin tribes.  The  other  most  highly  developed 
type  may  be  illustrated  by  the  circular  frame- 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


79 


houses  of  the  Mandans.1  These  houses  were  from 
forty  to  sixty  feet  in  diameter.  A dozen 
or  more  posts,  each  about  eight  inches  houses  of  tb* 
in  diameter,  were  set  in  the  ground, 

“ at  equal  distances  in  the  circumference  of  a cir- 
cle, and.  rising  about  six  feet  above  the  level  of 
the  floor.”  The  tops  of  the  posts  were  connected 
by  horizontal  stringers;  and  outside  each  post  a 
slanting  wooden  brace  sunk  in  the  ground  about 
four  feet  distant  served  as  a firm  support  to  the 
structure.  The  spaces  between  these  braces  were 
filled  by  tall  wooden  slabs,  set  with  the  same 
slant  and  resting  against  the  stringers.  Thus  the 
framework  of  the  outer  wall  was  completed.  To 
support  the  roof  four  posts  were  set  in  the  ground 
about  ten  feet  apart  in  the  form  of  a square,  near 
the  centre  of  the  building.  They  were  from 
twelve  to  fifteen  feet  in  height,  and  were  connected 
at  the  top  by  four  stringers  forming  a square. 
The  rafters  rested  upon  these  stringers  and  upon 
the  top  of  the  circular  wall  below.  The  rafters 
were  covered  with  willow  matting,  and  upon  this 
was  spread  a layer  of  prairie  grass.  Then  both 
wall  and  roof,  from  the  ground  up  to  the  summit, 
were  covered  with  earth,  solid  and  hard,  to  a thick- 
ness of  at  least  two  feet.  The  rafters  projected 
above  the  square  framework  at  the  summit,  so  as 
to  leave  a circular  opening  in  the  centre  about 
four  feet  in  diameter.  This  hole  let  in  a little 
light,  and  let  out  some  of  the  smoke  from  the  fire 
which  blazed  underneath  in  a fire-pit  lined  with 


1 Morgan,  Houses  and  House-Life , pp.  126-129 ; Cation's  North 
Amer.  Indians , i.  81  ff. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


81 


stone  slabs  set  on  edge.  The  only  other  aperture 
for  light  was  the  doorway,  which  was  a kind  of 
vestibule  or  passage  some  ten  feet  in  length.  Cur- 
tains of  buffalo  robes  did  duty  instead  of  doors. 
The  family  compartments  were  triangles  with  base 
at  the  outer  wall,  and  apex  opening  upon  the 
central  hearth;  and  the  partitions  were  hanging 
mats  or  skins,  which  were  tastefully  fringed  and 
ornamented  with  quill-work  and  pictographs.1  In 
the  lower  Mandan  village,  visited  by  Catlin,  there 
were  about  fifty  such  houses,  each  able  to  accom- 
modate from  thirty  to  forty  persons.  The  village, 
situated  upon  a bold  bluff  at  a bend  of  the  Mis- 
souri river,  and  surrounded  by  a palisade  of  stout 
timbers  more  than  ten  feet  in  height,  was  very 
strong  for  defensive  purposes.  Indeed,  it  was 
virtually  impregnable  to  Indian  methods  of  attack, 
for  the  earth-covered  houses  could  not  be  set  on 
fire  by  blazing  arrows,  and  just  within  the  palisade 
ran  a trench  in  which  the  defenders  could  securely 
skulk,  while  through  the  narrow  chinks  between 
the  timbers  they  could  shoot  arrows  fast  enough 
to  keep  their  assailants  at  a distance.  This  pur- 
pose was  further  secured  by  rude  bastions,  and 
considering  the  structure  as  a whole  one  cannot 
help  admiring  the  ingenuity  which  it  exhibits.  It 
shows  a marked  superiority  over  the  conceptions 
of  military  defence  attained  by  the  Iroquois  or 
any  other  Indians  north  of  New  Mexico.  Besides 
the  communal  houses  the  village  contained  its 
“ medicine  lodge,”  or  council  house,  and  an  open 
area  for  games  and  ceremonies.  In  the  spaces 
1 Catlin,  i.  83. 


82 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


between  the  houses  were  the  scaffolds  for  drying 
maize,  buffalo  meat,  etc.,  ascended  by  well-made 
portable  ladders.  Outside  the  village,  at  a short 
distance  on  the  prairie,  was  a group  of  such  scaf- 
folds upon  which  the  dead  were  left  to  moulder, 
somewhat  after  the  fashion  of  the  Parsees.1 

We  are  now  prepared  to  understand  some  es- 
sential points  in  the  life  of  the  groups  of  Indians 
occupying  the  region  of  the  Cordilleras,  both 
north  and  south  of  the  Isthmus  of  Darien,  all  the 
way  from  Zuni  to  Quito.  The  principal  groups 
are  the  Moquis  and  Zuhis  of  Arizona 
S?eeptSioS—  and  New  Mexico,  the  Nahuas  or  Na- 
status  of  bar-  huatlac  tribes  of  Mexico,  the  Mayas, 
Quiches,  and  kindred  peoples  of  Cen- 
tral America ; and  beyond  the  isthmus,  the  Chib- 
chas  of  New  Granada,  and  sundry  peoples  com- 
prised within  the  domain  of  the  Incas.  With 
regard  to  the  ethnic  relationships  of  these  various 
groups,  opinion  is  still  in  a state  of  confusion ; but 
it  is  not  necessary  for  our  present  purpose  that  we 
should  pause  to  discuss  the  numerous  questions 
thus  arising.  Our  business  is  to  get  a clear  notion 
in  outline  of  the  character  of  the  culture  to  which 
these  peoples  had  attained  at  the  time  of  the  Dis- 
covery. Here  we  observe,  on  the  part  of  all,  a 
very  considerable  divergence  from  the  average  In- 
dian level  which  we  have  thus  far  been  describing. 

This  divergence  increases  as  we  go  from  Zuni 
toward  Cuzco,  reaching  its  extreme,  on  the  whole, 
among  the  Peruvians,  though  in  some  respects  the 
1 Catlin,  i.  90. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


83 


nearest  approach  to  civilization  was  made  by  the 
Mayas.  All  these  peoples  were  at  least  one  full 
ethnical  period  nearer  to  true  civilization  than  the 
Iroquois,  — and  a vast  amount  of  change  and  im- 
provement is  involved  in  the  conception  of  an  en- 
tire ethnical  period.  According  to  Mr.  Morgan, 
one  more  such  period  would  have  brought  the 
average  level  of  these  Cordilleran  peoples  to  as 
high  a plane  as  that  of  the  Greeks  described  in 
the  Odyssey.  Let  us  now  observe  the  principal 
points  involved  in  the  change,  bearing  in  mind 
that  it  implies  a considerable  lapse  of  time.  While 
the  date  1325,  at  which  the  city  of  Mexico  was 
founded,  is  the  earliest  date  in  the  history  of  that 
country  which  can  be  regarded  as  securely  estab- 
lished, it  was  preceded  by  a long  series  of  generar 
tions  of  migration  and  warfare,  the  confused  and 
fragmentary  record  of  which  historians  have  tried 
— hitherto  with  scant  success  — to  unravel.  To 
develop  such  a culture  as  that  of  the  Aztecs  out  of 
an  antecedent  culture  similar  to  that  of  the  Iro- 
quois must  of  course  have  taken  a long  time. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  the  most  conspicu- 
ous distinctive  marks  of  the  grade  of  culture  at- 
tained by  the  Cordilleran  peoples  were  two,  — the 
cultivation  of  maize  in  large  quanti-  ^ ^ 
ties  by  irrigation,  and  the  use  of  adobe-  withimga- 
brick  or  stone  in  building-.  Probably  chitecture 
there  was  at  first,  to  some  extent,  a 
causal  connection  between  the  former  and  the  lat- 
ter. The  region  of  the  Moqui-Zuni  culture  is  a 
region  in  which  arid  plains  become  richly  fertile 
when  water  from  neighbouring  cliffs  or  peaks  is 


84 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


directed  down  upon  them.  It  is  mainly  an  affair 
of  sluices,  not  of  pump  or  well,  which  seem  to  have 
been  alike  beyond  the  ken  of  aboriginal  Ameri- 
cans of  whatever  grade.  The  change  of  occupa- 
tion involved  in  raising  large  crops  of  corn  by  the 
aid  of  sluices  would  facilitate  an  increase  in  density 
of  population,  and  would  encourage  a preference 
for  agricultural  over  predatory  life.  Such  changes 
would  be  likely  to  favour  the  development  of  de- 
fensive military  art.  The  Mohawk’s  surest  de- 
fence lay  in  the  terror  which  his  prowess  created 
hundreds  of  miles  away.  One  can  easily  see  how 
the  forefathers  of  our  Moquis  and  Zuriis  may  have 
come  to  prefer  the  security  gained  by  living  more 
closely  together  and  building  impregnable  for- 
tresses. 

The  earthen  wall  of  the  Mandan,  supported  on 
a framework  of  posts  and  slabs,  seems  to  me  cu- 
riously and  strikingly  suggestive  of  the  incipient 
pottery  made  by  surrounding  a basket  with  a 
coating  of  clay.1  When  it  was  discovered  how 
to  make  the  earthen  bowl  or  dish  without  the 
basket,  a new  era  in  progress  was  begun.  So 
when  it  was  discovered  that  an  earthen  wall  could 
be  fashioned  to  answer  the  requirements  of  house- 
builders without  the  need  of  a permanent  wooden 
framework,  another  great  step  was  taken.  Again 
the  consequences  were  great  enough  to 
of  adobe  archi-  make  it  mark  the  beginning  ot  a new 
ethnical  period.  If  we  suppose  the 
central  portion  of  our  continent,  the  Mississippi 
and  Missouri  valleys,  to  have  been  occupied  at 
1 See  above,  p.  25. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


85 


some  time  by  tribes  familiar  with  the  Mandan 
style  of  building;  and  if  we  further  suppose  a 
gradual  extension  or  migration  of  this  population, 
or  some  part  of  it,  westward  into  the  mountain  re- 
gion ; that  would  be  a movement  into  a region  in 
which  timber  was  scarce,  while  adobe  clay  was 
abundant.  Under  such  circumstances  the  useful 
qualities  of  that  peculiar  clay  could  not  fail  to  be 
soon  discovered.  The  simple  exposure  to  sunshine 
would  quickly  convert  a Mandan  house  built  with 
it  into  an  adobe  house  ; the  coating  of  earth  would 
become  a coating  of  brick.  It  would  not  then  take 
long  to  ascertain  that  with  such  adobe-brick  could 
be  built  walls  at  once  light  and  strong,  erect  and 
tall,  such  as  could  not  be  built  with  common  clay. 
In  some  such  way  as  this  I think  the  discovery 
must  have  been  made  by  the  ancestors  of  the 
Zunis,  and  others  who  have  built  pueblos.  After 
the  pueblo  style  of  architecture,  with  its  erect 
walls  and  terraced  stories,  had  become  developed, 
it  was  an  easy  step,  when  the  occasion  suggested 
it,  to  substitute  for  the  adobe-brick  coarse  rubble- 
stones  embedded  in  adobe.  The  final  stage  was 
reached  in  Mexico  and  Yucatan,  when  soft  coral- 
line limestone  was  shaped  into  blocks  with  a flint 
chisel  and  laid  in  courses  with  adobe-mortar. 

The  pueblos  of  New  Mexico  and  Arizona  are 
among  the  most  interesting  structures  in  the 
world.  Several  are  still  inhabited  by  the  de- 
scendants of  the  people  who  were  living  in  them 
at  the  time  of  the  Spanish  Discovery,  and  their 
primitive  customs  and  habits  of  thought  have 
been  preserved  to  the  present  day  with  but  little 


86  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

change.  The  long  sojourn  of  Mr.  Cushing,  of 
Mr.  Cushing  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology,  in  the  Zuiii 
at  zum.  pueblo,  has  already  thrown  a flood  of 
light  upon  many  points  in  American  archaeology.1 
As  in  the  case  of  American  aborigines  generally, 
the  social  life  of  these  people  is  closely  connected 
with  their  architecture,  and  the  pueblos  which  are 
still  inhabited  seem  to  furnish  us  with  the  key  to 
the  interpretation  of  those  that  we  find  deserted 
or  in  ruins,  whether  in  Arizona  or  in  Guatemala. 


In  the  architecture  of  the  pueblos  one  typical 
form  is  reproduced  with  sundry  varia- 
^ureofth™0  tions  in  detail.  The  typical  form  is 
that  of  a solid  block  of  buildings  mak- 
ing three  sides  of  an  extensive  rectangular  en- 

1 See  his  articles  in  the  Century  Magazine , Dec.,  1882,  Feb., 
1883,  May,  1883  ; and  his  papers  on  “ Zuni  Fetiches,”  Reports  of 
the  Bureau  of  Ethnology , ii.  9-45;  “ A Study  of  Pueblo  Pottery 
as  Illustrative  of  Zuni  Culture  Growth,”  id.  iv.  473-521 ; see  also 
Mrs.  Stevenson’s  paper,  “ Religious  Life  of  a Zuni  Child,”  id.  v. 
539-555 ; Sylvester  Baxter,  “ An  Aboriginal  Pilgrimage,”  Cen- 
tury Magazine , Aug.,  1882. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


87 


closure  or  courtyard.  On  the  inside,  facing  upon 
the  courtyard,  the  structure  is  but  one  story  in 
height ; on  the  outside,  looking  out  upon  the  sur- 
rounding country,  it  rises  to  three,  or  perhaps 
even  five  or  six  stories.  From  inside  to  outside 
the  flat  roofs  rise  in  a series  of  terraces,  so  that 
the  floor  of  the  second  row  is  continuous  with  the 
roof  of  the  first,  the  floor  of  the  third  row  is  con- 
tinuous with  the  roof  of  the  second,  and  on. 
The  fourth  side  of  the  rectangle  is  formed  by  a 
solid  block  of  one-story  apartments,  usually  with 
one  or  two  narrow  gateways  overlooked  by  higher 
structures  within  the  enclosure.  Except  these 
gateways  there  is  no  entrance  from  without ; the 
only  windows  are  frowning  loop-holes,  and  access 
to  the  several  apartments  is  gained  through  sky- 
lights reached  by  portable  ladders.  Such  a struc- 
ture is  what  our  own  forefathers  would  have  na- 
turally called  a “ burgh,”  or  fortress ; it  is  in  one 
sense  a house,  yet  in  another  sense  a town ; 1 its 
divisions  are  not  so  much  houses  as  compart- 
ments ; it  is  a joint-tenement  affair,  like  the  Iro- 
quois long  houses,  but  in  a higher  stage  of  de- 
velopment. 

So  far  as  they  have  been  studied,  the  pueblo 
Indians  are  found  to  be  organized  in  clans,  with 
descent  in  the  female  line,  as  in  the  case  of  the 
ruder  Indians  above  described.  In  the  event  of 
marriage  the  young  husband  goes  to  live  with  his 
wife,  and  she  may  turn  him  out  of  doors  if  he 

1 Cf.  Greek  oT/coj,  “ house,”  with  Latin  rricus,  “ street  ” or  “ vil- 
lage,” Sanskrit  vesa , “dwelling-place,”  English  wick,  “man- 
sion ” or  “ village.” 


Restoration  of  Pueblo  Hungo  Pavie. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  89 

deserves  it.1  The  ideas  of  property  seem  still  lim- 
ited to  that  of  possessory  right,  with  Puebl0B0. 
the  ultimate  title  in  the  clan,  except  ciety< 
that  portable  articles  subject  to  individual  owner- 
ship have  become  more  numerous.  In  govern- 
ment the  council  of  sachems  reappears  with  a 
principal  sachem,  or  cacique,  called  by  the  Span- 
iards “ gobernador.”  There  is  an  organized  priest- 
hood, with  distinct  orders,  and  a ceremonial  more 
elaborate  than  those  of  the  ruder  Indians.  In 
every  pueblo  there  is  to  be  found  at  least  one 
“ estufa,”  or  council-house,  for  governmental  or 
religious  transactions.  Usually  there  are  two  or 
three  or  more  such  estufas.  In  mythology,  in 
what  we  may  call  pictography  or  rudimentary 
hieroglyphics,  as  well  as  in  ordinary  handicrafts, 
there  is  a marked  advance  beyond  the  Indians  of 
the  lower  status  of  barbarism,  after  making  due 
allowances  for  such  things  as  the  people  of  the 
pueblos  have  learned  from  white  men.2 

1 “ With  the  woman  rests  the  security  of  the  marriage  ties ; 
and  it  must  be  said,  in  her  high  honour,  that  she  rarely  abuses 
the  privilege ; that  is,  never  sends  her  husband  ‘ to  the  home  of 
his  fathers,’  unless  he  richly  deserves  it.”  But  should  not  Mr. 
Cushing  have  said  “home  of  his  mothers,”  or  perhaps,  of  “his 
sisters  and  his  cousins  and  his  aunts  ? ” For  a moment  after- 
ward he  tells  us,  “ To  her  belong  all  the  children  ; and  descent, 
including  inheritance,  is  on  her  side.”  Century  Magazine , May, 
1883,  p.  35. 

2 For  example,  since  the  arrival  of  the  Spaniards  some  or  per- 
haps all  of  the  pueblos  have  introduced  chimneys  into  their  apart- 
ments ; but  when  they  were  first  visited  by  Coronado,  he  found 
the  people  wearing  cotton  garments,  and  Franciscan  friars  in 
1581  remarked  upon  the  superior  quality  of  their  shoes.  In  spin- 
ning and  weaving,  as  well  as  in  the  grinding  of  meal,  a notable 
advance  had  been  made. 


Restoration  of  Pueblo  Bonito. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


91 


From  the  pueblos  still  existing,  whether  in- 
habited or  in  ruins,  we  may  eventually  get  some 
sort  of  clue  to  the  populations  of  ancient  towns 
visited  by  the  Spanish  discoverers.1  Wonderfulan_ 
The  pueblo  of  Zuni  seems  to  have  had 
at  one  time  a population  of  5,000,  but  vaUey' 
it  has  dwindled  to  less  than  2,000.  Of  the  ruined 
pueblos,  built  of  stone  with  adobe  mortar,  in  the 
valley  of  the  Bio  Chaco,  the  Pueblo  Hungo  Pavie 
contained  73  apartments  in  the  first  story,  53  in 
the  second,  and  29  in  the  third,  with  an  average 
size  of  18  feet  by  13 ; and  would  have  accommo- 
dated about  1,000  Indians.  In  the  same  valley 
Pueblo  Bonito,  with  four  stories,  contained  not  less 
than  640  apartments,  with  room  enough  for  a pop- 
ulation of  3,000 ; within  a third  of  a mile  from 
this  huge  structure  stood  Pueblo  Chettro  Kettle, 
with  506  apartments.  The  most  common  variation 
from  the  rectangular  shape  was  that  in  which  a 
terraced  semicircle  was  substituted  for  the  three 
terraced  sides,  as  in  Pueblo  Bonito,  or  the  whole 
rectangular  design  was  converted  into  an  ellipse, 
as  in  Pueblo  Penasca  Blanca.  There  are  indica- 
tions that  these  fortresses  were  not  in  all  cases 
built  at  one  time,  but  that,  at  least  in  some  cases, 
they  grew  by  gradual  accretions.2  The  smallness 
of  the  distances  between  those  in  the  Chaco  val- 
ley suggests  that  their  inhabitants  must  have  been 
united  in  a confederation  ; and  one  can  easily  see 
that  an  actual  juxtaposition  or  partial  coalescence 

1 At  least  a better  one  than  Mr.  Prescott  had  when  he  naively 
reckoned  five  persons  to  a household,  Conquest  of  Mexico , ii.  97. 

2 Morgan,  Houses  and  House-Life,  chap.  vii. 


92 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


of  such  communities  would  have  made  a city  of 
very  imposing  appearance.  The  pueblos  are  al- 


ways found  situated  near  a river,  and  their  gar- 
dens, lying  outside,  are  easily  accessible  to  sluices 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


93 


from  neighbouring  cliffs  or  mesas.  But  in  some 
cases,  as  the  Wolpi  pueblo  of  the  Mo-  T^Moqui 
quis,  the  whole  stronghold  is  built  upon  puebl0lu 
the  summit  of  the  cliff ; there  is  a coalescence  of 
communal  structures,  each  enclosing  a courtyard, 
in  which  there  is  a spring  for  the  water-supply ; 
and  the  irrigated  gardens  are  built  in  terrace-form 
just  below  on  the  bluff,  and  protected  by  solid 
walls.  From  this  curious  pueblo  another  transi- 
tion takes  us  to  the  extraordinary  cliff-houses 
found  in  the  Chelly,  Mancos,  and  McElmo  cafions, 
and  elsewhere,  — veritable  human  eyries  perched 
in  crevices  or  clefts  of  the  perpendic-  ^ cliff 
ular  rock,  accessible  only  by  dint  of  a puebl08* 
toilsome  and  perilous  climb  ; places  of  refuge,  per- 
haps for  fragments  of  tribes  overwhelmed  by  more 
barbarous  invaders,  yet  showing  in  their  dwelling- 
rooms  and  estufas  marks  of  careful  building  and 
tasteful  adornment.1 

The  pueblo  of  Zuni  is  a more  extensive  and 
complex  structure  than  the  ruined  pueblos  on  the 
Chaco  river.  It  is  not  so  much  an  enormous  com- 
munal house  as  a small  town  formed  of  a number 
of  such  houses  crowded  together,  with  access  from 
one  to  another  along  their  roof-terraces.  Pueblo  of 
Some  of  the  structures  are  of  adobe  ZuSi* 
brick,  others  of  stone  embedded  in  adobe  mortar 

1 For  careful  descriptions  of  the  ruined  pueblos  and  cliff- 
houses,  see  Nadaillac’s  Prehistoric  America,  chap,  v.,  and  Short’s 
North  Americans  of  Antiquity , chap.  vii.  The  latter  sees  in  them 
the  melancholy  vestiges  of  a people  gradually  “ succumbing  to 
their  unpropitious  surroundings  — a land  which  is,  fast  becoming 
a howling  wilderness,  with  its  scourging  sands  and  roaming  savage 
Bedouin — the  Apaches.” 


94 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


and  covered  with  plaster.  There  are  two  open 
plazas  or  squares  in  the  town,  and  several  streets, 
some  of  which  are  covered  ways  passing  beneath 
the  upper  stories  of  houses.  The  effect,  though 
not  splendid,  must  be  very  picturesque,  and  would 
doubtless  astonish  and  bewilder  visitors  unpre- 
pared for  such  a sight.  When  Coronado’s  men 
discovered  Zuni  in  1540,  although  that  style  of 
building  was  no  longer  a novelty  to  them,  they 
compared  the  place  to  Granada. 

Now  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  Cortes  made  the 
same  comparison  in  the  case  of  Tlascala,  one  of  the 
famous  towns  at  which  he  stopped  on  his  march 
from  Vera  Cruz  to  the  city  of  Mexico.  In  his 
letter  to  the  emperor  Charles  V.,  he  compared 
Pueblo  of  Tlascala  to  Granada,  “ affirming  that  it 
Tiascaia.  was  larger,  stronger,  and  more  populous 
than  the  Moorish  capital  at  the  time  of  the  con- 
quest, and  quite  as  well  built.”  1 Upon  this  Mr. 
Prescott  observes,  “we  shall  be  slow  to  believe 
that  its  edifices  could  have  rivalled  those  monu- 
ments of  Oriental  magnificence,  whose  light  aerial 
forms  still  survive  after  the  lapse  of  ages,  the  ad- 
miration of  every  traveller  of  sensibility  and  taste. 
The  truth  is  that  Cortes,  like  Columbus,  saw  ob- 
jects through  the  warm  medium  of  his  own  fond 
imagination,  giving  them  a higher  tone  of  colour- 
ing and  larger  dimensions  than  were  strictly  war- 
ranted by  the  fact.”  Or,  as  Mr.  Bandelier  puts 

1 “La  qual  ciudad  . . . es  muy  mayor  que  Granada,  ymuy 
mas  fuerte,  y de  tan  buenos  edificios,  y de  mucha  mas  gente,  que 
Granada  tenia  al  tiempo  que  se  gaiio.”  Cortes,  Relacion  segunda 
al  Emperador,  ap.  Lorenzana,  p.  58,  cited  in  Prescott’s  Conquest 
of  Mexico , vol.  i.  p.  401  (7th  ed.,  London,  1855). 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


95 


it,  when  it  comes  to  general  statements  about 
numbers  and  dimensions,  “ the  descriptions  of  the 
conquerors  cannot  be  taken  as  facts,  only  as  the 
expression  of  feelings,  honestly  entertained  but 
uncritical.”  From  details  given  in  various  Span- 
ish descriptions,  including  those  of  Cortes  himself, 
it  is  evident  that  there  could  not  have  been  much 
difference  in  size  between  Tlascala  and  its  neigh- 
bour Cholula.  The  population  of  the  latter  town 
has  often  been  given  as  from  150,000  to  200,000  ; 
but,  from  elaborate  archaeological  investigations 
made  on  the  spot  in  1881,  Mr.  Bandelier  con- 
cludes that  it  cannot  have  greatly  exceeded  30,- 
000.  and  this  number  really  agrees  with  the  esti- 
mates of  two  very  important  Spanish  authorities, 
Las  Casas  and  Torquemada,  when  correctly  under- 
stood.1 We  may  therefore  suppose  that  the  popu- 
lation of  Tlascala  was  about  30,000.  Now  the 
population  of  the  city  of  Granada,  at  the  time  of 


1 See  Bandelier’s  Archaeological  Tour  in  Mexico,  Boston,  1885, 
pp.  160-164.  Torquemada’s  words,  cited  by  Bandelier,  are 
“ Quando  entraron  los  Espafioles,  dicen  que  tenia  mas  de  quarenta 
mil  vecinos  esta  ciudad.”  Monarqma  Indiana , lib.  iii.  cap.  xix. 
p.  281.  A prolific  source  of  error  is  the  ambiguity  in  the  word 
vecinos , which  may  mean  either  “ inhabitants  ” or  “household- 
ers.” Where  Torquemada  meant  40,000  inhabitants,  uncritical 
writers  fond  of  the  marvellous  have  understood  him  to  mean 
40,000  houses,  and  multiplying  this  figure  by  5,  the  average 
number  of  persons  in  a modern  family,  have  obtained  the  figure 
200,000.  But  40,000  houses  peopled  after  the  old  Mexican  fash- 
ion, with  at  least  200  persons  in  a house  (to  put  it  as  low  as  pos- 
sible), would  make  a city  of  8,000,000  inhabitants ! Las  Casas, 
in  his  Destruycion  de  las  Indias,  vii.,  puts  the  population  of  Cho- 
lula at  about  30,000.  I observe  that  Llorente  (in  hir  (Euvres  de 
Las  Casas,  tom.  i.  p.  38)  translates  the  statement  correctly.  I 
shall  recur  to  this  point  below,  vol.  ii.  p.  264. 


96 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


its  conquest  by  Ferdinand  and  Isabella,  is  said  by 
the  greatest  of  Spanish  historians  1 to  have  been 
about  200,000.  It  would  thus  appear  that  Cortes 
sometimes  let  his  feelings  run  away  with  him ; 
and,  all  things  considered,  small  blame  to  him  if 
he  did!  In  studying  the  story  of  the  Spanish 
conquest  of  America,  liberal  allowance  must  often 
be  made  for  inaccuracies  of  statement  that  were 
usually  pardonable  and  sometimes  inevitable. 

But  when  Cortes  described  Tlascala  as  “quite 
as  well  built  ” as  Granada,  it  is  not  at  all  likely 
that  he  was  thinking  about  that  exquisite  Moorish 
architecture  which  in  the  mind  of  Mr.  Prescott 
or  any  cultivated  modern  writer  is  the  first  thing 
to  be  suggested  by  the  name.  The  Spaniards  of 
those  days  did  not  admire  the  artistic  work  of 
“ infidels  ; ” they  covered  up  beautiful  arabesques 
with  a wash  of  dirty  plaster,  and  otherwise  be- 
haved very  much  like  the  Puritans  who  smashed 
the  “ idolatrous  ” statues  in  English  cathedrals. 
When  Cortes  looked  at  Tlascala,  and  Coronado 
looked  at  Zuni,  and  both  soldiers  were  reminded 
of  Granada,  they  were  probably  looking  at  those 
places  with  a professional  eye  as  fortresses  hard 
to  capture ; and  from  this  point  of  view  there  was 
doubtless  some  justice  in  the  comparison. 

In  the  description  of  Tlascala  by  the  Spaniards 
who  first  saw  it,  with  its  dark  and  narrow  streets, 
its  houses  of  adobe,  or  “ the  better  sort  ” of  stone 
laid  in  adobe  mortar,  and  its  flat  and  terraced 
roofs,  one  is  irresistibly  reminded  of  such  a pueblo 

1 Mariana,  Historia  de  Espana , Valencia,  1795,  tom.  viii.  p. 
317. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA . 


97 


as  Zufii.  Tlascala  was  a town  of  a type  prob- 
ably common  in  Mexico.  In  some  respects,  as 
will  hereafter  appear,  the  city  of 
Mexico  showed  striking  variations  from  dty  “m^ico 
the  common  type.  Yet  there  too  were 
to  be  seen  the  huge  houses,  with  ter-  puebl0, 
raced  roofs,  built  around  a square  courtyard;  in 
one  of  them  450  Spaniards,  with  more  than  1,000 
Tlascalan  allies,  were  accommodated ; in  another, 
called  “ Montezuma’s  palace,”  one  of  the  conquer- 
ors, who  came  several  times  intending  to  see  the 
whole  of  it,  got  so  tired  with  wandering  through 
the  interminable  succession  of  rooms  that  at 
length  he  gave  it  up  and  never  saw  them  all.1 
This  might  have  happened  in  such  a building  as 
Pueblo  Bonito ; and  a suspicion  is  raised  that 
Montezuma’s  city  was  really  a vast  composite 
pueblo,  and  that  its  so-called  palaces  were  com- 
munal buildings  in  principle  like  the  pueblos  of 
the  Chaco  valley. 

Of  course  the  Spanish  discoverers  could  not  be 
expected  to  understand  the  meaning  of  what  they 
saw.  It  dazed  and  bewildered  them.  They  knew 
little  or  nothing  of  any  other  kind  of  Natural  mia- 
society  than  feudal  monarchy,  and  if  St 
they  made  such  mistakes  as  to  call  the  c07erera* 
head  war-chief  a -“king”  (i.  e.  feudal  king)  or 
“ emperor,”  and  the  clan-chiefs  “ lords  ” or  “ noble- 
men,” if  they  supposed  that  these  huge  fortresses 

1 “ Et  io  entrai  piu  di  quattro  volte  in  una  casa  del  gran  Signor 
non  por  altro  effetto  che  per  vederla,  et  ogni  volta  vi  camminauo 
tanto  che  mi  stancauo,  et  mai  la  fini  di  vedere  tutta.”  Relatione 
fatta  per  un  gentiV  huomo  del  Signor  Fernando  Cortese,  apnd  Ra- 
musio,  Navigationi  et  Viaggi,  Venice,  1556,  tom.  iii.  fol.  309. 


98 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


were  like  feudal  castles  and  palaces  in  Europe, 
they  were  quite  excusable.  Such  misconceptions 
were  common  enough  before  barbarous  societies 
had  been  much  studied ; and  many  a dusky  war- 
rior, without  a tithe  of  the  pomp  and  splendour 
about  him  that  surrounded  Montezuma,  has  figured 
in  the  pages  of  history  as  a mighty  potentate  girt 
with  many  of  the  trappings  of  feudalism.1  Initial 
misconceptions  that  were  natural  enough,  indeed 
unavoidable,  found  expression  in  an  absurdly  in- 
appropriate nomenclature ; and  then  the  use  of 
wrong  names  and  titles  bore  fruit  in  what  one 
cannot  properly  call  a theory  but  rather  an  inco- 
herent medley  of  notions  about  barbaric  society. 
Nothing  could  be  further  from  feudalism,  in  which 
the  relation  of  landlord  and  tenant  is  a funda- 
mental element,  than  the  society  of  the  American 
aborigines,  in  which  that  relation  was  utterly  un- 
contrast  be-  known  and  inconceivable.  This  more 

San dUda1’  primitive  form  of  society  is  not  improp- 
gentiiism.  erly  called  gentilism,  inasmuch  as  it  is 
based  upon  the  gens  or  clan,  with  communism  in 

1 When  Pocahontas  visited  London  in  1616  she  was  received  at 
court  as  befitted  a “ king’s  daughter,”  and  the  old  Virginia  his- 
torian, William  Stith  (born  in  1689),  says  it  was  a “ constant 
tradition”  in  his  day  that  James  I.  “became  jealous,  and  was 
highly  offended  at  Mr.  Rolfe  for  marrying  a princess.”  The  no- 
tion was  that  “ if  Virginia  descended  to  Pocahontas,  as  it  might 
do  at  Powhatan’s  death,  at  her  own  death  the  kingdom  would  be 
vested  in  Mr.  Rolfe’s  posterity.”  Esten  Cooke’s  Virginia , p.  100. 
Powhatan  (i.  e.  Wahunsunakok,  chief  of  the  Powhatan  tribe)  was 
often  called  “emperor”  by  the  English  settlers.  To  their  in- 
tense bewilderment  he  told  one  of  them  that  his  office  would  de- 
scend to  his  [maternal]  brothers,  even  though  he  had  sons  living. 
It  was  thought  that  this  could  not  be  true. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


99 


living,  and  with  the  conception  of  individual  own- 
ership of  property  undeveloped.  It  was  gentilism 
that  everywhere  prevailed  throughout  the  myriads 
of  unrecorded  centuries  during  which  the  foremost 
races  of  mankind  struggled  up  through  savagery 
and  barbarism  into  civilization,  while  weaker  and 
duller  races  lagged  behind  at  various  stages  on 
the  way.  The  change  from  “ gentile  ” Chan(,e  from 
society  to  political  society  as  we  know  it  C^iitiSiiety 
was  in  some  respects  the  most  impor-  *ociety' 
tant  change  that  has  occurred  in  human  affairs 
since  men  became  human.  It  might  be  roughly 
defined  a3  the  change  from  personal  to  territorial 
organization.  It  was  accomplished  when  the  sta- 
tionary clan  became  converted  into  the  township, 
and  the  stationary  tribe  into  the  small  state ; 1 
when  the  conception  of  individual  property  in  land 
was  fully  acquired  ; when  the  tie  of  physical  kin- 
ship ceased  to  be  indispensable  as  a bond  for  hold- 
ing a society  together  ; when  the  clansman  became 
a citizen . This  momentous  change  was  accom- 
plished among  the  Greeks  during  a period  begin- 

1 The  small  states  into  which  tribes  were  at  first  transformed 
have  in  many  cases  survived  to  the  present  time  as  portions  of 
great  states  or  nations.  The  shires  or  counties  of  England,  which 
have  been  reproduced  in  the  United  States,  originated  in  this 
way,  as  I have  briefly  explained  in  my  little  book  on  Civil  Gov- 
ernment in  the  United  States , p.  49.  When  you  look  on  the  map 
of  England,  and  see  the  town  of  IcJclingham  in  the  county  of 
Suffolk , it  means  that  this  place  was  once  the  “ home  ” of  the 
“ Icklings  ” or  “ children  of  Ickel,”  a clan  which  formed  part  of 
the  tribe  of  Angles  known  as  “South  folk.”  So  the  names  of 
Gaulish  tribes  survived  as  names  of  French  provinces,  e.  g.  Au- 
vergne from  the  Arverni , Poitou  from  the  Pictavi,  Anjou  from 
the  Andecavi , Biarn  from  the  Bigerrones , etc. 


100 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


ning  shortly  before  the  first  Olympiad  (b.  c.  776), 
and  ending  with  the  reforms  of  Kleisthenes  at 
Athens  (b.  c.  509) ; among  the  Romans  it  was 
accomplished  by  the  series  of  legislative  changes 
beginning  with  those  ascribed  to  Servius  Tullius 
(about  B.  c.  550),  and  perfected  by  the  time  of 
the  first  Punic  War  (b.  c.  264-241).  In  each 
case  about  three  centuries  was  required  to  work 
the  change.1  If  now  the  reader,  familiar  with  Eu- 
ropean history,  will  reflect  upon  the  period  of  more 
than  a thousand  years  which  intervened  between 
the  date  last  named  and  the  time  when  feudalism 
became  thoroughly  established,  if  he  will  recall  to 
mind  the  vast  and  powerful  complication  of  causes 
which  operated  to  transform  civil  society  from  the 
aspect  which  it  wore  in  the  days  of  Regulus  and 
the  second  Ptolemy  to  that  which  it  had  assumed 
in  the  times  of  Henry  the  Fowler  or  Fulk  of  An- 
jou, he  will  begin  to  realize  how  much  “ feudal- 
ism ” implies,  and  what  a wealth  of  experience  it 
involves,  above  and  beyond  the  change  from  44  gen- 
tile ” to  44  civil  ” society.  It  does  not  appear  that 
any  people  in  ancient  America  ever  approached 
very  near  to  this  earlier  change.  None  had  fairly 
begun  to  emerge  from  gentilism ; none  had  ad- 
vanced so  far  as  the  Greeks  of  the  first  Olympiad 
or  the  Romans  under  the  rule  of  the  Tarquins. 

The  first  eminent  writer  to  express  a serious 

1 “It  was  no  easy  task  to  accomplish  such  a fundamental 
change,  however  simple  and  obvious  it  may  now  seem.  . . . An- 
terior to  experience,  a township,  as  the  unit  of  a political  system, 
was  abstruse  enough  to  tax  the  Greeks  and  Romans  to  the  depths 
of  their  capacities  before  the  conception  was  formed  and  set  in 
practical  operation.”  Morgan,  Ancient  Society , p.  218. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  101 

doubt  as  to  the  correctness  of  the  earlier  views  of 
Mexican  civilization  was  that  sagacious 
Scotchman,  William  Robertson.1  The  totheen-o- 

_ i *1  i * neousneae  of 

illustrious  statesman  and  philologist,  thespaniah 
Albert  Gallatin,  founder  of  the  Ameri- 
can Ethnological  Society,  published  in  the  first 
volume  of  its  “ Transactions  ” an  essay  which  rec- 
ognized the  danger  of  trusting  the  Spanish  narra- 
tives without  very  careful  and  critical  scrutiny.2 
It  is  to  be  observed  that  Mr.  Gallatin  approached 
the  subject  with  somewhat  more  knowledge  of 
aboriginal  life  in  America  than  had  been  pos- 
sessed by  previous  writers.  A similar  scepticism 
was  expressed  by  Lewis  Cass,  who  also  knew  a 
great  deal  about  Indians.3  Next  came  Mr.  Mor- 
gan,4 the  man  of  path-breaking  ideas,  whose  mi- 
nute and  profound  acquaintance  with  Indian  life 
was  joined  with  a power  of  penetrating  the  hidden 
implications  of  facts  so  keen  and  so  sure  as  to 

1 Robertson’s  History  of  America,  9th  ed.  vol.  iii.  pp.  274,  281. 

2 “ Notes  on  the  Semi-civilized  Nations  of  Mexico,  Yucatan, 
and  Central  America,”  American  Ethnological  Society’s  Transac- 
tions, vol.  i.,  New  York,  1852.  There  is  a brief  account  of  Mr. 
Gallatin’s  pioneer  work  in  American  philology  and  ethnology  in 
Stevens’s  Albert  Gallatin , pp.  386-396. 

3 Cass,  “Aboriginal  Structures,”  North  Amer.  Review , Oct., 
1840. 

4 Mr.  R.  A.  Wilson’s  New  History  of  the  Conquest  of  Mexico , 
Philadelphia,  1859,  denounced  the  Spanish  conquerors  as  whole- 
sale liars,  but  as  his  book  was  ignorant,  uncritical,  and  full  of  wild 
fancies,  it  produced  little  effect.  It  was  demolished,  with  neat- 
ness and  despatch,  in  two  articles  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly , April 
and  May,  1859,  by  the  eminent  historian  John  Foster  Kirk,  whose 
History  of  Charles  the  Bold  is  in  many  respects  a worthy  compan- 
ion to  the  works  of  Prescott  and  Motiey.  Mr.  Kirk  had  been  Mr. 
Prescott’s  secretary. 


102 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


amount  to  genius.  Mr.  Morgan  saw  the  nature 
of  the  delusion  under  which  the  Spaniards  la- 
boured ; he  saw  that  what  they  mistook  for  feudal 
castles  owned  by  great  lords,  and  inhabited  by 
Detection  and  dependent  retainers,  were  really  huge 
the' eworTby  communal  houses,  owned  and  inhabited 
Lewis  Morgan.  ^ c]ans?  or  rather  by  segments  of  over- 
grown clans.  He  saw  this  so  vividly  that  it  be- 
trayed him  now  and  then  into  a somewhat  impa- 
tient and  dogmatic  manner  of  statement ; but  that 
was  a slight  fault,  for  what  he  saw  was  not  the 
outcome  of  dreamy  speculation  but  of  scientific 
insight.  His  researches,  which  reduced  “Monte- 
zuma’s empire  ” to  a confederacy  of  tribes  dwell- 
ing in  pueblos,  governed  by  a council  of  chiefs,  and 
collecting  tribute  from  neighbouring  pueblos,  have 
been  fully  sustained  by  subsequent  investigation. 

The  state  of  society  which  Cortes  saw  has,  in- 
deed, passed  away,  and  its  monuments  and  hiero- 
glyphic records  have  been  in  great  part  destroyed. 
Nevertheless  some  monuments  and  some  hiero- 
glyphic records  remain,  and  the  people  are  still 
there.  Tlascalans  and  Aztecs,  descendants  in  the 
eleventh  or  twelfth  generation  from  the  men  whose 
bitter  feuds  gave  such  a golden  opportunity  to 
Cortes,  still  dwell  upon  the  soil  of  Mexico,  and 
speak  the  language  in  which  Montezuma  made 
his  last  harangue  to  the  furious  people.  There  is, 
moreover,  a great  mass  of  literature  in  Spanish, 
besides  more  or  less  in  Nahuatl,  written  during  the 
century  following  the  conquest,  and  the  devoted 
missionaries  and  painstaking  administrators,  who 
wrote  books  about  the  country  in  which  they  were 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


103 


working,  were  not  engaged  in  a wholesale  conspir- 
acy for  deceiving  mankind.  From  a really  critical 
study  of  this  literature,  combined  with  archaeolog- 
ical investigation,  much  may  be  expected ; and  a 
noble  beginning  has  already  been  made.  A more 
extensive  acquaintance  with  Mexican  literature 
would  at  times  have  materially  modified  Mr.  Mor- 
gan’s conclusions,  though  without  altering  their 
general  drift.  At  this  point  the  work 
has  been  taken  up  by  Mr.  Adolf  Bande-  delier’s  re- 
lier,  of  Highland,  Illinois,  to  whose  rare 
sagacity  and  untiring  industry  as  a field  archaeol- 
ogist is  joined  such  a thorough  knowledge  of 
Mexican  literature  as  few  men  before  him  have 
possessed.  Armed  with  such  resources,  Mr.  Ban- 
delier  is  doing  for  the  ancient  history  of  Amer- 
ica work  as  significant  as  that  which  Mommsen 
has  done  for  Kome,  or  Baur  for  the  beginnings 
of  Christianity.  When  a sufficient  mass  of  facts 
and  incidents  have  once  been  put  upon  record,  it 
is  hard  for  ignorant  misconception  to  bury  the 
truth  in  a pit  so  deep  but  that  the  delving  genius 
of  critical  scholarship  will  sooner  or  later  drag  it 
forth  into  the  light -of  day.1 

At  this  point  in  our  exposition  a very  concise 
summary  of  Mr.  Bandelier’s  results  will  suffice  to 

1 A summary  of  Mr.  Bandelier’s  principal  results,  with  copious 
citation  and  discussion  of  original  Spanish  and  Nahuatl  sources,  is 
contained  in  his  three  papers,  “ On  the  art  of  war  and  mode  of 
warfare  of  the  ancient  Mexicans,” — “On  the  distribution  and 
tenure  of  land,  and  the  customs  with  respect  to  inheritance, 
among  the  ancient  Mexicans,”  — “ On  the  social  organization  and 
mode  of  government  of  the  ancient  Mexicans,”  Peabody  Museum 
Reports , vol.  ii.,  1876-79,  pp.  95-161,  385-448,  557-699. 


104 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


enable  the  reader  to  understand  their  import. 
What  has  been  called  the  “empire  of  Monte- 
zuma ” was  in  reality  a confederacy  of  three  tribes, 
the  Aztecs,  Tezcucans,  and  Tlacopans,1  dwelling  in 
three  large  composite  pueblos  situated  very  near 
together  in  one  of  the  strongest  defensive  po- 
The  Aztec  sitions  ever  occupied  by  Indians.  This 
confederacy,  j^tec  confederacy  extended  its  “ sway  ” 
over  a considerable  portion  of  the  Mexican  pe- 
ninsula, but  that  “ sway  ” could  not  correctly  be 
described  as  “ empire,”  for  it  was  in  no  sense  a 
military  occupation  of  the  country.  The  confeder- 
acy did  not  have  garrisons  in  subject  pueblos 
or  civil  officials  to  administer  their  affairs  for 
them.  It  simply  sent  some  of  its  chiefs  about 
from  one  pueblo  to  another  to  collect  tribute. 
This  tax  consisted  in  great  part  of  maize  and 
other  food,  and  each  tributary  pueblo  reserved  a 
certain  portion  of  its  tribal  territory  to  be  culti- 
vated for  the  benefit  of  the  domineering  confed- 
eracy. If  a pueblo  proved  delinquent  or  recalci- 
trant, Aztec  warriors  swooped  down  upon  it  in 
stealthy  midnight  assault,  butchered  its  inhab- 
itants and  emptied  its  granaries,  and  when  the 
paroxysm  of  rage  had  spent  itself,  went  exulting 
homeward,  carrying  away  women  for  concubines, 

1 In  the  Iroquois  confederacy  the  Mohawks  enjoyed  a certain 
precedence  or  seniority,  the  Onondagas  had  the  central  council- 
fire,  and  the  Senecas,  who  had  the  two  head  war-chiefs,  were 
much  the  most  numerous.  In  the  Mexican  confederacy  the  va- 
rious points  of  superiority  seem  to  have  been  more  concentrated 
in  the  Aztecs ; hut  spoils  and  tribute  were  divided  into  five  por- 
tions, of  which  Mexico  and  Tezcuco  each  took  two,  and  Tlacopan 
one. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


105 


men  to  be  sacrificed,  and  such  miscellaneous  booty 
as  could  be  conveyed  without  wagons  or  beasts  to 
draw  them.1  If  the  sudden  assault,  with  scaling 
ladders,  happened  to  fail,  the  assailants  were  likely 
to  be  baffled,  for  there  was  no  artillery,  and  so  lit- 
tle food  could  be  carried  that  a siege  meant  starve 
tion  for  the  besiegers. 

The  tributary  pueblos  were  also  liable  to  be 
summoned  to  furnish  a contingent  of  warriors  to 
the  war-parties  of  the  confederacy,  under  the  same 
penalties  for  delinquency  as  in  the  case  of  refusal 
of  tribute.  In  such  cases  it  was  quite  common  for 
the  confederacy  to  issue  a peremptory  summons, 
followed  by  a declaration  of  war.  When  a pueblo 
was  captured,  the  only  way  in  which  the  van- 
quished people  could  stop  the  massacre  was  by 
holding  out  signals  of  submission ; a parley  then 
sometimes  adjusted  the  affair,  and  the  payment  of 
a year’s  tribute  in  advance  induced  the  conquerors 
to  depart,  but  captives  once  taken  could  seldom 
if  ever  be  ransomed.  If  the  parties  could  not 
agree  upon  terms,  the  slaughter  was  renewed,  and 
sometimes  went  on  until  the  departing  victors  left 
nought  behind  them  but  ruined  houses  belching 
from  loop-hole  and  doorway  lurid  clouds  of  smoke 
and  flame  upon  narrow  silent  streets  heaped  up 
with  mangled  corpses. 

The  sway  of  the  Aztec  confederacy  over  the 
Mexican  peninsula  was  thus  essentially  similar  to 
the  sway  of  the  Iroquois  confederacy  over  a great 
part  of  the  tribes  between  the  Connecticut  river 

1 The  wretched  prisoners  were  ordinarily  compelled  to  carry 
the  booty. 


106 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


and  the  Mississippi.  It  was  simply  the  levying  of 
tribute,  — a system  of  plunder  enforced  by  terror. 
The  so-called  empire  was  “only  a partnership 
formed  for  the  purpose  of  carrying  on  the  busi- 
ness of  warfare,  and  that  intended,  not  for  the  ex- 
tension of  territorial  ownership,  but  only  for  an 
increase  of  the  means  of  subsistence.” 1 There 
was  none  of  that  coalescence  and  incorporation  of 
peoples  which  occurs  after  the  change  from  gen- 
tilism  to  civil  society  has  been  effected.  Among 
the  Mexicans,  as  elsewhere  throughout  North 
America,  the  tribe  remained  intact  as  the  highest 
completed  political  integer. 

The  Aztec  tribe  was  organized  in  clans  and 
, phratries,  and  the  number  of  clans 

Aztec  clans.  A . 7 . 

would  indicate  that  the  tribe  was  a very 
large  one.2  There  were  twenty  clans,  called  in  the 
Nahuatl  language  “ calpullis.”  We  may  fairly 
suppose  that  the  average  size  of  a clan  was  larger 

1 Bandelier,  op.  cit.  p.  563. 

2 The  notion  of  an  immense  population  groaning-  under  the 
lash  of  taskmasters,  and  building  huge  palaces  for  idle  despots 
must  be  dismissed.  The  statements  which  refer  to  such  a vast 
population  are  apt  to  be  accompanied  by  incompatible  state- 
ments. Mr.  Morgan  is  right  in  throwing  the  burden  of  proof 
upon  those  who  maintain  that  a people  without  domestic  animals 
or  field  agriculture  could  have  been  so  numerous  (Anc.  Soc.,  p. 
195).  On  the  other  hand,  I believe  Mr.  Morgan  makes  a grave 
mistake  in  the  opposite  direction,  in  underestimating  the  numbers 
that  could  be  supported  upon  Indian  corn  even  under  a system  of 
horticulture  without  the  use  of  the  plough.  Some  pertinent  re- 
marks on  the  extraordinary  reproductive  power  of  maize  in  Mex- 
ico may  be  found  in  Humboldt,  Essai  politique  sur  la  Nouvelle 
Espagne , Paris,  1811,  tom.  iii.  pp.  51-60  ; the  great  naturalist  is 
of  course  speaking  of  the  yield  of  maize  in  ploughed  lands,  but, 
after  making  due  allowances,  the  yield  under  the  ancient  system 
must  have  been  wellnigh  unexampled  in  barbaric  agriculture. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


107 


than  the  average  tribe  of  Algonquins  or  Iroquois ; 
but  owing  to  the  compact  “ city  ” life,  this  increase 
of  numbers  did  not  result  in  segmentation  and 
scattering,  as  among  Indians  in  the  lower  status. 
Each  Aztec  clan  seems  to  have  occupied  a number 
of  adjacent  communal  houses,  forming  a kind  of 
precinct,  with  its  special  house  or  houses  for  offi- 
cial purposes,  corresponding  .to  the  estufas  in  the 
New  Mexican  pueblos.  The  houses  were  the  com- 
mon property  of  the  clan,  and  so  was  the  land 
which  its  members  cultivated;  and  such  houses 
and  land  could  not  be  sold  or  bartered  away  by 
the  clan,  or  in  anywise  alienated.  The  idea  of 
“ real  estate  ” had  not  been  developed ; the  clan 
simply  exercised  a right  of  occupancy,  and  — as 
among  some  ruder  Indians  — its  individual  mem- 
bers exercised  certain  limited  rights  of  user  in 
particular  garden-plots. 

The  clan  was  governed  by  a clan  council,  consist- 
ing of  chiefs  ( tecuhtli ) elected  by  the  clan,  and 
inducted  into  office  after  a cruel  religious  ordeal, 
in  which  the  candidate  was  bruised,  tortured,  and 
half  starved.  Am  executive  department 
was  more  clearly  differentiated  from  the  Cbm  offlcer8, 
council  than  among  the  Indians  of  the  lower  star 
tus.  The  clan  ( calpulli ) had  an  official  head,  or 
sachem,  called  the  calpullec  ; and  also  a military 
commander  called  the  ahcacautin , or  “ elder 
brother.”  The  ahcacautin  was  also  a kind  of 
peace  officer,  or  constable,  for  the  precinct  occupied 
by  the  clan,  and  carried  about  with  him  a staff  of 
office  ; a tuft  of  white  feathers  attached  to  this 
staff  betokened  that  his  errand  was  one  of  death. 


108  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


The  clan  elected  its  calpullec  and  ahcacautin , and 
could  depose  them  for  cause.1 

The  members  of  the  clan  were  reciprocally 
bound  to  aid,  defend,  and  avenge  one  another ; but 
wergild  was  no  longer  accepted,  and  the  penalty 
for  murder  was  death.  The  clan  exercised  the 
right  of  naming  its  members.  Such  names  were 
invariably  significant  (as  Nemhualcoyotl , “ Hungry 
Coyote,”  Axayacatl , “ Face-in-the- Water,”  etc.), 
and  more  or  less  “ medicine,”  or  super- 

Rightsand  . . . r 

duties  of  the  stitious  association,  was  attached  to  the 
name.  The  clans  also  had  their  signifi- 
cant names  and  totems.  Each  clan  had  its  pecul- 
iar religious  rites,  its  priests  or  medicine-men  who 
were  members  of  the  clan  council,  and  its  temple 
or  medicine-house.  Instead  of  burying  their  dead 
the  Mexican  tribes  practised  cremation  ; there  was, 
therefore,  no  common  cemetery,  but  the  funeral 
ceremonies  were  conducted  by  the  clan. 

The  clans  of  the  Aztecs,  like  those  of  many 
other  Mexican  tribes,  were  organized  into  four 
phratries ; and  this  divided  the  city  of  Mexico, 
Aztec  phra-  as  Spaniards  at  once  remarked,  into 
tries.  four  quarters.  The  phratry  had  ac- 

quired more  functions  than  it  possessed  in  the 
lower  status.  Besides  certain  religious  and  social 
duties,  and  besides  its  connection  with  the  punish- 
ment of  criminals,  the  Mexican  phratry  was  an 
organization  for  military  purposes.2  The  four 


1 Compare  this  description  with  that  of  the  institutions  of  In- 
dians in  the  lower  status,  above,  p.  69. 

2 In  this  respect  it  seems  to  have  had  some  resemblance  to  the 
Roman  centuria  and  Teutonic  hundred.  So  in  prehistoric  Greece 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


109 


phratries  were  four  divisions  of  the  tribal  host, 
each  with  its  captain.  In  each  of  the  quarters 
was  an  arsenal,  or  “ dart-house,”  where  weapons 
were  stored,  and  from  which  they  were  handed  out 
to  war-parties  about  to  start  on  an  expedition. 

The  supreme  government  of  the  Aztecs  was 
vested  in  the  tribal  council  composed  ^ tribal 
of  twenty  members,  one  for  each  clan.  counciL 
The  member,  representing  a clan,  was  not  its  cal- 
pullec , or  “ sachem ; ” he  was  one  of  the  tecuhtli, 
or  clan-chiefs,  and  was  significantly  called  the 
“ speaker  ” ( tlatoani ).  The  tribal  council,  thus 
composed  of  twenty  speakers,  was  called  the  tla- 
tocan , or  “ place  of  speech.”  1 At  least  as  often 
as  once  in  ten  days  the  council  assembled  at  the 
tecpan , or  official  house  of  the  tribe,  but  it  could 
be  convened  whenever  occasion  required,  and  in 
cases  of  emergency  was  continually  in  session.  Its 
powers  and  duties  were  similar  to  those  of  an  an- 
cient English  shiremote,  in  so  far  as  they  were 
partly  directive  and  partly  judicial.  A large  part 
of  its  business  was  settling  disputes  between  the 

we  may  perhaps  infer  from  Nestor’s  advice  to  Agamemnon  that  a 
similar  organization  existed : — 

Kpiv  &vdpas  Kara  <pv\a,  Kara  (ppjjrpas,  ' Ay dpefivov, 

&s  (pp^rpri  <pp’f)pTT]<f)iv  ap^iyri,  <pv\a  8k  <pv\ois. 

Iliad,  ii.  362. 

But  the  phratry  seems  never  to  have  reached  so  high  a develop- 
ment among  the  Greeks  as  among  the  Romans  and  the  early 
English. 

1 Compare  parliament  from  parler.  These  twenty  were  the 
“ grandees,”  “ counsellors,”  and  “ captains  ” mentioned  by  Bernal 
Diaz  as  always  in  Montezuma’s  company ; “ y siempre  & la 
contina  estaban  en  su  compaitfa  veinte  grandes  seilores  y consejeros 
y capitanes,”  etc.  Historia  verdadera,  ii.  95.  See  Bandelier,  op. 
cit.  p.  646. 


110 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


clans.  It  superintended  the  ceremonies  of  inves- 
titure with  which  the  chiefs  and  other  officers 
of  the  clans  were  sworn  into  office.  At  intervals 
of  eighty  days  there  was  an  “ extra  session  ” of 
the  tlatocan , attended  also  by  the  twenty  “ elder 
brothers,”  the  four  phratry-captains,  the  two  exec- 
utive chiefs  of  the  tribe,  and  the  leading  priests, 
and  at  such  times  a reconsideration  of  an  unpopu- 
lar decision  might  be  urged ; but  the  authority  of 
the  tlatocan  was  supreme,  and  from  its  final  deci- 
sion there  could  be  no  appeal.1 2 

The  executive  chiefs  of  the  tribe  were  two  in 
number,  as  was  commonly  the  case  in  ancient 
America.  The  tribal  sachem,  or  civil  executive, 
bore  the  grotesque  title  of  cihuacoatl , or  “ snake- 
The  “ snake-  woman.” 2 His  relation  to  the  tribe 
woman.”  was  in  general  like  that  of  the  calpul- 
lec  to  the  clan.  He  executed  the  decrees  of  the 
tribal  council,  of  which  he  was  ex  officio  a mem- 
ber, and  was  responsible  for  the  housing  of  tribute 
and  its  proper  distribution  among  the  clans. 
He  was  also  chief  judge,  and  he  was  lieutenant 
to  the  head  war-chief  in  command  of  the  tribal 

1 Mr.  Bandelier’s  note  on  this  point  gives  an  especially  apt 
illustration  of  the  confusion  of  ideas  and  inconsistencies  of  state- 
ment amid  which  the  early  Spanish  writers  struggled  to  under- 
stand and  describe  this  strange  society : op.  cit.  p.  651. 

2 In  Aztec  mythology  Cihuacoatl  was  wife  of  the  supreme 
night  deity,  Tezcatlipoca.  Squier,  Serpent  Symbol  in  America,  pp. 
159-166,  174-183.  On  the  connection  between  serpent  worship 
and  human  sacrifices,  see  Fergusson’s  Tree  and  Serpent  Worship, 
pp.  3-5,  38-41.  Much  evidence  as  to  American  serpent  worship 
is  collected  in  J.  G.  Muller’s  Geschichte  der  amerikanischen  Urre- 
ligionen,  Basel,  1855.  The  hieroglyphic  emblem  of  the  Aztec 
tribal  sachem  was  a female  head  surmounted  by  a snake. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  Ill 

host.1  He  was  elected  for  life  by  the  tribal  council, 
which  could  depose  him  for  misconduct. 

The  office  of  head  war-chief  was  an  instance  of 
primitive  royalty  in  a very  interesting  stage  of 
development.  The  title  of  this  officer  was  tlaca- 
tecuhtli , or  “ chief-  of- men.”  2 He  was  primarily 
head  war-chief  of  the  Aztec  tribe,  but  about  1430 
became  supreme  military  commander  of  The  « chief-of- 
the  three  confederate  tribes,  so  that  his  men  ” 
office  was  one  of  peculiar  dignity  and  impor- 
tance. When  the  Spaniards  arrived  upon  the 
scene  Montezuma  was  tlacatecuhtli , and  they  nat- 
urally called  him  “king.”  To  understand  pre- 
cisely how  far  such  an  epithet  could  correctly  be 
applied  to  him,  and  how  far  it  was  misleading,  we 
must  recall  the  manner  in  which  early  kingship 
arose  in  Europe.  The  Roman  rex  was  an  officer 
elected  for  life ; the  typical  Greek  basileus  was 
a somewhat  more  fully  developed  king,  inasmuch 
as  his  office  was  becoming  practically  hereditary  ; 
otherwise  rex  was  about  equivalent  to  Evolution  of 
basileus.  Alike  in  Rome  and  in  Greece 
the  king  had  at  least  three  great  func-  Rome• 
tions,  and  possibly  four.3  He  was,  primarily,  chief 

1 Other  tribes  besides  the  Aztec  had  the  “ snake-woman.”  In 
the  city  of  Mexico  the  Spaniards  mistook  him  for  a “ second- 
king,”  or  “ royal  lieutenant.”  In  other  towns  they  regarded  him, 
somewhat  more  correctly,  as  “governor,”  and  called  him  gober- 
nador , — a title  still  applied  to  the  tribal  sachem  of  the  pueblo 
Indians,  as  e.  g.  in  Zufii  heretofore  mentioned ; see  above  p.  89. 

2 This  title  seems  precisely  equivalent  to  &va£  avSpwv,  com- 
monly applied  to  Agamemnon,  and  sometimes  to  other  chieftains, 
in  the  Iliad. 

3 Ramsay’s  Roman  Antiquities,  p.  64;  Hermann’s  Political 
Antiquities  of  Greece , p.  105  ; Morgan,  Anc.  Soc.,  p.  248. 


112  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


commander,  secondly,  chief  priest,  thirdly,  chief 
judge ; whether  he  had  reached  the  fourth  stage 
and  added  the  functions  of  chief  civil  executive, 
is  matter  of  dispute.  Kingship  in  Rome  and  in 
most  Greek  cities  was  overthrown  at  so  early  a 
date  that  some  questions  of  this  sort  are  difficult 
to  settle.  But  in  all  probability  the  office  grew 
up  through  the  successive  acquisition  of  ritual, 
judicial,  and  civil  f unctions  by  the  military  com- 
mander. The  paramount  necessity  of  consulting 
the  tutelar  deities  before  fighting  resulted  in  mak- 
ing the  general  a priest  competent  to  perform 
sacrifices  and  interpret  omens ; 1 he  thus  naturally 
became  the  most  important  among  priests  ; an  in- 
creased sanctity  invested  his  person  and  office; 
and  by  and  by  he  acquired  control  over  the  dispen- 
sation of  justice,  and  finally  over  the  whole  civil 
administration.  One  step  more  was  needed  to 
develop  the  basileus  into  a despot,  like  the  king 
of  Persia,  and  that  was  to  let  him  get  into  his 
hands  the  law-making  power,  involving  complete 
control  over  taxation.  When  the  Greeks  and  Ro- 
mans became  dissatisfied  with  the  increasing  pow- 
ers of  their  kings,  they  destroyed  the  office.  The 

1 Such  would  naturally  result  from  the  desirableness  of  secur- 
ing’ unity  of  command.  If  Demosthenes  had  been  in  sole  com- 
mand of  the  Athenian  armament  in  the  harbour  of  Syracuse,  and 
had  been  a basileus , with  priestly  authority,  who  can  doubt  that 
some  such  theory  of  the  eclipse  as  that  suggested  by  Philochorus 
would  have  been  adopted,  and  thus  one  of  the  world’s  great 
tragedies  averted  ? See  Grote,  Hist.  Greece , vol.  vii.  chap.  lx. 
M.  Fustel  de  Coulanges,  in  his  admirable  book  La  CiU  antique , 
pp.  205-210,  makes  the  priestly  function  of  the  king  primitive, 
and  the  military  function  secondary ; which  is  entirely  inconsist- 
ent with  what  we  know  of  barbarous  races. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


113 


Romans  did  not  materially  diminish  its  functions, 
but  put  them  into  commission,  by  entrusting  them 
to  two  consuls  of  equal  authority  elected  annually. 
The  Greeks,  on  the  other  hand,  divided  the  royal 
functions  among  different  officers,  as  e.  g.  at  Ath- 
ens among  the  nine  archons.1 

The  typical  kingship  in  mediaeval  Europe,  after 
the  full  development  of  the  feudal  system,  was 
very  different  indeed  from  the  kingship  in  early 
Greece  and  Rome.  In  the  Middle  Ages  Medi*vai 
all  priestly  functions  had  passed  into  kingwhip' 
the  hands  of  the  Church.2  A king  like  Charles 
VII.  of  France,  or  Edward  III.  of  England,  was 
military  commander,  civil  magistrate,  chief  judge, 
and  supreme  landlord ; the  people  were  his  ten- 
ants. That  was  the  kind  of  king  with  which  the 
Spanish  discoverers  of  Mexico  were  familiar. 

Now  the  Mexican  tlacatecuhtli , or  “ chief-of- 
men,”  was  much  more  like  Agamemnon  in  point 
of  kingship  than  like  Edward  III.  He  was  not 
supreme  landlord,  for  landlordship  did  not  exist 
in  Mexico.  He  was  not  chief  judge  or  civil  mag- 

1 It  is  worthy  of  note  that  the  archon  who  retained  the  priestly 
function  was  called  basileus,  showing*  perhaps  that  at  that  time 
this  had  come  to  he  most  prominent  among  the  royal  functions, 
or  more  likely  that  it  was  the  one  with  which  reformers  had  some 
religious  scruples  about  interfering.  The  Romans,  too,  retained 
part  of  the  king’s  priestly  function  in  an  officer  called  rex  sacro- 
rum , whose  duty  was  at  times  to  offer  a sacrifice  in  the  forum, 
and  then  run  away  as  fast  as  legs  could  carry  him,  — V 6v<ras  6 
Pa<n\ei>Sy  /caret  rdxos  Hireiai  (pevyuv  ay o pas  (!)  Plutarch,  Qucest. 

Rom.  63. 

2 Something  of  the  priestly  quality  of  “sanctity,”  however, 
surrounded  the  king’s  person ; and  the  ceremony  of  anointing 
the  king  at  his  coronation  was  a survival  of  the  ancient  rite  which 
invested  the  head  war-chief  with  priestly  attributes. 


114  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


istrate  ; those  functions  belonged  to  the  “ snake- 
woman.”  Mr.  Bandelier  regards  the  “ chief -of- 
men”  as  simply  a military  commander;  but  for 
reasons  which  I shall  state  hereafter,1  it 

Montezuma  . . 

was  a “ priest-  seems  quite  clear  that  he  exercised  cer- 

commander.”  . . . 

tain  very  important  priestly  functions, 
although  beside  him  there  was  a kind  of  high- 
priest  or  medicine-chief.  If  I am  right  in  hold- 
ing that  Montezuma  was  a “priest-commander,” 
then  incipient  royalty  in  Mexico  had  advanced 
at  least  one  stage  beyond  the  head  war-chief  of 
the  Iroquois,  and  remained  one  stage  behind  the 
basileus  of  the  Homeric  Greeks. 

The  tlacatecuhtli , or  “ chief-of-men,”  was  elected 
by  an  assembly  consisting  of  the  tribal  council, 
the  “ elder  brothers  ” of  the  several  clans,  and  cer- 
tain leading  priests.  Though  the  office  was  thus 
elective,  the  choice  seems  to  have  been 
cession  to  the  practically  limited  to  a particular  clan, 
and  in  the  eleven  chiefs  who  were 
chosen  from  1375  to  1520  a certain  principle  or 
custom  of  succession  seems  to  be  plainly  indi- 
cated.2 There  was  a further  limit  to  the  order  of 
succession.  Allusion  has  been  made  to  the  four 
phratry-captains  commanding  the  quarters  of  the 

1 They  can  be  most  conveniently  stated  in  connection  with  the 
story  of  the  conquest  of  Mexico  ; see  below,  vol.  ii.  p.  278.  When 
Mr.  Bandelier  completes  his  long-promised  paper  on  the  ancient 
Mexican  religion,  perhaps  it  will  appear  that  he  has  taken  these 
facts  into  the  account. 

2 I cannot  follow  Mr.  Bandelier  in  discrediting  Clavigero’s 
statement  that  the  office  of  tlacatecuhtli  “ should  always  remain 
in  the  house  of  Acamapitzin,”  inasmuch  as  the  eleven  who  were 
actually  elected  were  all  closely  akin  to  one  another.  In  point  of 
fact  it  did  remain  “ in  the  house  of  Acamapitzin.” 


\ 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  115 

city.  Their  cheerful  titles  were  “ man  of  the 
house  of  darts,”  “ cutter  of  men,”  “ bloodshedder,” 
and  “ chief  of  the  eagle  and  cactus.”  These  cap- 
tains were  military  chiefs  of  the  phratries,  and  also 
magistrates  charged  with  the  duty  of  maintain- 
ing order  and  enforcing  the  decrees  of  the  council 
in  their  respective  quarters.  The  “ chief  of  the 
eagle  and  cactus”  was  chief  executioner, — Jack 
Ketch.  He  was  not  eligible  for  the  office  of 
“ chief-of-men  ; ” the  three  other  phratry-captains 
were  eligible.  Then  there  was  a member  of  the 
priesthood  entitled  “man  of  the  dark  house.” 
This  person,  with  the  three  eligible  captains,  made 
a quartette,  and  one  of  this  privileged  four  must 
succeed  to  the  office  of  “ chief-of-men.” 

The  eligibility  of  the  “ man  of  the  dark  house  ” 
may  be  cited  here  as  positive  proof  that  some- 
times the  “chief-of-men”  could  be  a “ priest-com- 
mander.” That  in  all  cases  he  acquired  priestly 
functions  after  election,  even  when  he  did  not 
possess  them  before,  is  indicated  by  the  fact  that 
at  the  ceremony  of  his  induction  into  office  he 
ascended  to  the  summit  of  the  pyramid  sacred 
to  the  war-god  Huitzilopochtli,  where  he  was 
anointed  by  the  high-priest  with  a black  ointment, 
and  sprinkled  with  sanctified  water ; having  thus 
become  consecrated  he  took  a censer  of  live  coals 
and  a bag  of  copal,  and  as  his  first  official  act 
offered  incense  to  the  war-god.1 

1 H.  H.  Bancroft,  Native  Races  of  the  Pacific  States , vol.  ii.  p. 
145.  Hence  the  accounts  of  the  reverent  demeanour  of  the  peo- 
ple toward  Montezuma,  though  perhaps  overcoloured,  are  not 
so  absurd  as  Mr.  Morgan  deemed  them.  Mr.  Morgan  was  some- 
times too  anxious  to  reduce  Montezuma  to  the  level  of  an  Iro- 
quois war- chief. 


116 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


As  the  44  chief -of- men  ” was  elected,  so  too  he 
could  be  deposed  for  misbehaviour.  He  was  ex 
officio  a member  of  the  tribal  council,  and  he  had 
his  official  residence  in  the  tecpan , or  tribal  house, 
where  the  meetings  of  the  council  were  held,  and 
where  the  hospitalities  of  the  tribe  were  extended 
to  strangers.  As  an  administrative  officer,  the 
44  chief-of-men  ” had  little  to  do  within  the  limits 
of  the  tribe;  that,  as  already  observed,  was  the 
business  of  the  44  snake-woman.”  But  outside  of 
the  confederacy  the  44  chief-of-men  ” exercised  ad- 
ministrative functions.  He  superintended  the  col- 
lection of  tribute.  Each  of  the  three  confederate 
Manner  of  coi-  trlbes  appointed,  through  its  tribal 
lectmg tribute.  councy^  agents  to  visit  the  subjected 

pueblos  and  gather  in  the  tribute.  These  agents 
were  expressively  termed  calpixqui , 44  crop-gather- 
ers.” As  these  men  were  obliged  to  spend  con- 
siderable time  in  the  vanquished  pueblos  in  the 
double  character  of  tax-collectors  and  spies,  we 
can  imagine  how  hateful  their  position  was.  Their 
security  from  injury  depended  upon  the  reputation 
of  their  tribes  for  ruthless  ferocity.1  The  tiger- 
like confederacy  was  only  too  ready  to  take  of- 
fence; in  the  lack  of  a decent  pretext  it  often 
went  to  war  without  one,  simply  in  order  to  get 
human  victims  for  sacrifice. 

Once  appointed,  the  tax-gatherers  were  directed 

1 As  I have  elsewhere  observed  in  a similar  case : — “ Each 
summer  there  came  two  Mohawk  elders,  secure  in  the  dread  that 
Iroquois  prowess  had  everywhere  inspired ; and  up  and  down  the 
Connecticut  valley  they  seized  the  tribute  of  weapons  and  wam- 
pum, and  proclaimed  the  last  harsh  edict  issued  from  the  savage 
council  at  Onondaga.”  Beginnings  of  New  England , p.  121. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


117 


by  the  “chief- of -men.”  The  tribute  was  chiefly 
maize,  but  might  be  anything  the  conquerors 
chose  to  demand,  — weapons,  fine  pottery  or 
featherwork,  gold  ornaments,  or  female  slaves. 
Sometimes  the  tributary  pueblo,  instead  of  sacri- 
ficing all  its  prisoners  of  war  upon  its  own  altars, 
sent  some  of  them  up  to  Mexico  as  part  of  its  trib- 
ute. The  ravening  maw  of  the  horrible  deities 
was  thus  appeased,  not  by  the  pueblo  that  paid 
the  blackmail,  but  by  the  power  that  extorted  it, 
and  thus  the  latter  obtained  a larger  share  of  di- 
vine favour.  Generally  the  unhappy  prisoners 
were  forced  to  carry  the  corn  and  other  articles. 
They  were  convoyed  by  couriers  who  saw  that 
everything  was  properly  delivered  at  the  tecpan , 
and  also  brought  information  by  word  of  mouth 
and  by  picture-writing  from  the  calpixqui  to  the 
“ chief-of-men.”  When  the  newly-arrived  Span- 
iards saw  these  couriers  coming  and  going  they 
fancied  that  they  were  “ ambassadors.”  This  sys- 
tem of  tribute-taking  made  it  necessary  to  build 
roads,  and  this  in  turn  facilitated,  not  only  military 
operations,  but  trade,  which  had  already  made  some 
progress  albeit  of  a simple  sort.  These  “roads” 
might  perhaps  more  properly  be  called  Indian 
trails,1  but  they  served  their  purpose. 

The  general  similarity  of  the  Aztec  confederacy 

1 See  Salmeron’s  letter  of  August  13, 1531,  to  the  Council  of 
the  Indies,  cited  in  Bandelier,  op.  cit.  p.  696.  The  letter  recom- 
mends that  to  increase  the  security  of  the  Spanish  hold  upon  the 
country  the  roads  should  he  made  practicable  for  beasts  and 
wagons.  They  were  narrow  paths  running  straight  ahead  up  hill 
and  down  dale,  sometimes  crossing  narrow  ravines  upon  heavy 
stone  culverts. 


118  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


to  that  of  the  Iroquois,  in  point  of  social  structure, 
is  thus  clearly  manifest.  Along  with  this  general 
Aztec  and  iro-  similarity  we  have  observed  some  points 
eracfes  con-^"  °f  higher  development,  such  as  one 
trasted.  might  expect  to  find  in  traversing  the 
entire  length  of  an  ethnical  period.  Instead  of 
stockaded  villages,  with  houses  of  bark  or  of  clay 
supported  upon  a wooden  framework,  we  have 
pueblos  of  adobe-brick  or  stone,  in  various  stages 
of  evolution,  the  most  advanced  of  which  present 
the  appearance  of  castellated  cities.  Along  with 
the  systematic  irrigation  and  increased  dependence 
upon  horticulture,  we  find  evidences  of  greater 
density  of  population;  and  we  see  in  the  victo- 
rious confederacy  a more  highly  developed  organi- 
zation for  adding  to  its  stock  of  food  and  other 
desirable  possessions  by  the  systematic  plunder 
of  neighbouring  weaker  communities.  Naturally 
such  increase  in  numbers  and  organization  entails 
some  increase  in  the  number  of  officers  and  some 
differentiation  of  their  functions,  as  illustrated  in 
the  representation  of  the  clans  (calpulli)  in  the 
tribal  council  ( tlatocan ),  by  speakers  ( tlatoani ) 
chosen  for  the  purpose,  and  not  by  the  official 
heads  ( calpullec ) of  the  clan.  Likewise  in  the 
military  commander-in-chief  ( tlacatecuhtli ) we 
observe  a marked  increase  in  dignity,  and  — as  I 
have  already  suggested  and  hope  to  maintain  — we 
find  that  his  office  has  been  clothed  with  sacerdo- 
tal powers,  and  has  thus  taken  a decided  step  to- 
ward kingship  of  the  ancient  type,  as  depicted  in 
the  Homeric  poems. 

No  feature  of  the  advance  is  more  noteworthy 


ANCIENT  AMERICA.  119 

than  the  development  of  the  medicine-men  into  an 
organized  priesthood.1  The  presence  of 

. , -T  . , , Aztec  prieut- 

this  priesthood  and  its  ritual  was  pro-  hood : human 

1 # sacrifices. 

claimed  to  the  eyes  of  the  traveller  in 
ancient  Mexico  by  the  numerous  tall  truncated 
pyramids  ( teocallis ),  on  the  flat  summits  of  which 
men,  women,  and  children  were  sacrificed  to  the 
gods.  This  custom  of  human  sacrifice  seems  to 
have  been  a characteristic  of  the  middle  period 
of  barbarism,  and  to  have  survived,  with  dimin- 
ishing frequency,  into  the  upper  period.  There 
are  abundant  traces  of  its  existence  throughout 
the  early  Aryan  world,  from  Britain  to  Hindu- 
stan, as  well  as  among  the  ancient  Hebrews  and 
their  kindred.2  But  among  all  these  peoples,  at 
the  earliest  times  at  which  we  can  study  them 
with  trustworthy  records,  we  find  the  custom  of 
human  sacrifice  in  an  advanced  stage  of  decline, 
and  generally  no  longer  accompanied  by  the  cus- 
tom of  cannibalism  in  which  it  probably  origi- 
nated.3 Among  the  Mexicans,  however,  when  they 
were  first  visited  by  the  Spaniards,  cannibalism 
flourished  as  nowhere  else  in  the  world  except 
perhaps  in  Fiji,  and  human  sacrifices  were  con- 

1 The  priesthood  was  not  hereditary,  nor  did  it  form  a caste. 
There  was  no  hereditary  nobility  in  ancient  Mexico,  nor  were 
there  any  hereditary  vocations,  as  “artisans,”  “ merchants,”  etc. 
See  Bandelier,  op.  cit.  p.  599. 

2 See  the  copious  references  in  Tylor’s  Primitive  Culture , ii. 
340-371 ; Mackay,  Religious  Development  of  the  Greeks  and  He- 
brews, ii.  406-434;  Oort  and  Hooykaas,  The  Bible  for  Young 
People , i.  30,  189-193 ; ii.  102,  220 ; iii.  21, 170,  316,  393,  395 ; iv. 
85,  226.  Ghillany,  Die  Menschenopfer  der  alten  Hebraer , Nurem- 
berg-, 1842,  treats  the  subject  with  much  learning. 

3 Spencer,  Princip.  Sociol .,  i.  287 ; Tylor,  op.  cit.  ii.  345. 


120 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


ducted  on  such  a scale  as  could  not  have  been 
witnessed  in  Europe  without  going  back  more 
than  forty  centuries. 

The  custom  of  sacrificing  captives  to  the  gods 
was  a marked  advance  upon  the  practice  in  the 
lower  period  of  barbarism,  when  the  prisoner,  un- 
less saved  by  adoption  into  the  tribe  of  his  cap- 
tors,  was  put  to  death  with  lingering  torments. 
There  were  occasions  on  which  the  Aztecs  tortured 
their  prisoners  before  sending  them  to  the  altar,1 
but  in  general  the  prisoner  was  well-treated  and 
highly  fed,  — fatted,  in  short,  for  the  final  ban- 
quet in  which  the  worshippers  participated  with 
their  savage  deity.2  In  a more  advanced  stage 
of  development  than  that  which  the  Aztecs  had 
reached,  in  the  stage  when  agriculture  became 
extensive  enough  to  create  a steady  demand  for 
servile  labour,  the  practice  of  enslaving  prisoners 
became  general ; and  as  slaves  became  more  and 
more  valuable,  men  gradually  succeeded  in  com- 
pounding with  their  deities  for  easier  terms,  — a 
ram,  or  a kid,  or  a bullock,  instead  of  the  human 
victim.3 

1 Mr.  Prescott,  to  avoid  shocking  the  reader  with  details,  re- 
fers him  to  the  twenty-first  canto  of  Dante’s  Inferno,  Conquest  of 
Mexico,  vol.  i.  p.  64. 

2 See  below,  vol.  ii.  p.  283. 

3 The  victim,  by  the  offer  of  which  the  wrath  of  the  god  was 
appeased  or  his  favour  solicited,  must  always  be  some  valued 
possession  of  the  sacrificer.  Hence,  e.  g.,  among  the  Hebrews 
“ wild  animals,  as  not  being  property,  were  generally  considered 
unfit  for  sacrifice.”  (Mackay,  op.  cit.  ii.  398.)  Among  the  Aztecs 
(Prescott,  loc.  cit.)  on  certain  occasions  of  peculiar  solemnity  the 
clan  offered  some  of  its  own  members,  usually  children.  In  the 
lack  of  prisoners  such  offerings  would  more  often  be  necessary, 
hence  one  powerful  incentive  to  war.  The  use  of  prisoners  to 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


121 


The  ancient  Mexicans  had  not  arrived  at  this 
stage,  which  in  the  Old  World  characterized  the 
upper  period  of  barbarism.  Slavery  had,  however, 
made  a beginning  among  the  Aztecs. 

° ® ® Aztec  slaves. 

The  nucleus  of  the  small  slave-popu- 
lation of  Mexico  consisted  of  outcasts , persons 
expelled  from  the  clan  for  some  misdemeanour. 
The  simplest  case  was  that  in  which  a member 
of  a clan  failed  for  two  years  to  cultivate  his 
garden-plot.1  The  delinquent  member  was  de- 
prived, not  only  of  his  right  of  user,  but  of  all  his 
rights  as  a clansman,  and  the  only  way  to  escape 
starvation  was  to  work  upon  some  other  lot,  either 

buy  the  god’s  favour  was  to  some  extent  a substitute  for  the  use 
of  the  clan’s  own  members,  and  at  a later  stage  the  use  of  do- 
mestic animals  was  a further  substitution.  The  legend  of  Abra- 
ham and  Isaac  ( Genesis , xxii.  1-14)  preserves  the  tradition  of  this 
latter  substitution  among  the  ancient  Hebrews.  Compare  the 
Boeotian  legend  of  the  temple  of  Dionysos  Aigobolos  : — Moines 
yap  rep  deep  irpo'f)xQrt)(rav  wore  virb  fiedr] s is  vfipiv,  Sxrre  KaX  rov  At o- 
vvffov  rbv  tepea  cutout  elvovaiv  • cutout  elvavras  bh  avr'ina  4ir4\a(ic 
vSffos  Xoi/jLCtibrjs  * Kal  crcpiaiv  cupluero  a pa  4k  Ae\<pojpt  r$  Aiovvacp 
Bveiv  iraiSa  wpofiov  • erei n Se  ov  iroWols  varepop  top  6e6v  <paaiv 
alya  iepeTov  viraWa^ai  fffplaiv  avrl  tov  iraTSos.  Pausanias,  ix.  8. 
A further  stage  of  progress  was  the  substitution  of  a mere  inanh 
mate  symbol  for  a living  victim,  whether  human  or  brute,  aC 
shown  in  the  old  Roman  custom  of  appeasing  “ Father  Tiber  ” 
once  a year  by  the  ceremony  of  drowning  a lot  of  dolls  in  that 
river.  Of  this  significant  rite  Mommsen  aptly  observes,  “ Die 
Ideen  gottlicher  Gnade  und  Versohnbarkeit  sind  hier  ununter- 
scheidbar  gemischt  mit  der  frommen  Schlauigkeit,  welche  es  ver- 
sucht  den  gefahrlichen  Herrn  durch  scheinhafte  Befriedigung  zu 
beriicken  und  abzufinden.”  Romische  Geschichte,  4"  AuflL,  1865, 
bd.  i.  p.  176.  After  reading  such  a remark  it  may  seem  odd  to 
find  the  writer,  in  a footnote,  refusing  to  accept  the  true  explana- 
tion of  the  custom ; but  that  was  a quarter  of  a century  ago, 
when  much  less  was  known  about  ancient  society  than  now. 

1 Bandolier,  op.  cit.  p.  611. 


122 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


in  his  own  or  in  some  other  clan,  and  be  paid  in 
such  pittance  from  its  produce  as  the  occupant 
might  choose  to  give  him.  This  was  slavery  in 
embryo.  The  occupant  did  not  own  this  outcast 
labourer,  any  more  than  he  owned  his  lot ; he  only 
possessed  a limited  right  of  user  in  both  labourer 
and  lot.  To  a certain  extent  it  was  “ adverse  ” or 
exclusive  possession.  If  the  slave  ran  away  or 
was  obstinately  lazy,  he  could  be  made  to  wear  a 
wooden  collar  and  sold  without  his  consent ; if  it 
proved  too  troublesome  to  keep  him,  the  collared 
slave  could  be  handed  over  to  the  priests  for 
sacrifice.1  In  this  class  of  outcasts  and  their 
masters  we  have  an  interesting  illustration  of  a 
rudimentary  phase  of  slavery  and  of  private  prop- 
erty. 

At  this  point  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  in  the 
development  of  the  family  the  Aztecs  had  ad- 
vanced considerably  beyond  the  point  attained  by 
Shawnees  and  Mohawks,  and  a little  way  toward 
the  point  attained  in  the  patriarchal  family  of  the 
ancient  Romans  and  Hebrews.  In  the  Aztec  clan 
(which  was  exogamous  2)  the  change  to  descent  in 
The  Aztec  the  male  line  seems  to  have  been  accom- 
famiiy.  plished  before  the  time  of  the  Discovery. 
Apparently  it  had  been  recently  accomplished. 
Names  for  designating  family  relationships  re- 
mained in  that  primitive  stage  in  which  no  dis- 

1 There  was,  however,  in  this  extreme  case,  a right  of  sanctuary. 
If  the  doomed  slave  could  flee  and  hide  himself  in  the  tecpan  be- 
fore the  master  or  one  of  his  sons  could  catch  him,  he  became 
free  and  recovered  his  clan-rights ; and  no  third  person  was  al- 
lowed to  interfere  in  aid  of  the  pursuer.  Torquemada,  Monarquia 
Indiana,  ii.  504-566. 

2 Bancroft,  Native  Races  of  the  Pacific  States , vol.  ii.  p.  251. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


123 


tinction  is  made  between  father  and  uncle,  grand- 
children and  cousins.  The  family  was  still  too 
feebly  established  to  count  for  much  in  the  struc- 
ture of  society,  which  still  rested  firmly  upon  the 
clan.1  Nevertheless  the  marriage  bonds  were 
drawn  much  tighter  than  among  Indians  of  the 
lower  status,  and  penalties  for  incontinence  were 
more  severe.  The  wife  became  her  husband’s 
property  and  was  entitled  to  the  protection  of  his 
clan.  All  matrimonial  arrangements  were  con- 
trolled by  the  clan,  and  no  member  of  it,  male  or 
female,  was  allowed  to  remain  unmarried,  except 
for  certain  religious  reasons.  The  penalty  for 
contumacy  was  expulsion  from  the  clan,  and  the 
same  penalty  was  inflicted  for  such  sexual  irregu- 
larities as  public  opinion,  still  in  what  we  should 
call  quite  a primitive  stage,  condemned.  Men 
and  women  thus  expelled  went  to  swell  the  num- 
bers of  that  small  class  of  outcasts  already  noted. 
With  men  the  result,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a kind 
of  slavery ; with  women  it  was  prostitution ; and 
it  is  curious  to  see  that  the  same  penalty,  entail- 
ing such  a result,  was  visited  alike  upon  unseemly 
frailty  and  upon  refusal  to  marry.  In  either  case 
the  sin  consisted  in  rebellion  against  the  clan’s 
standards  of  proper  or  permissible  behaviour. 

The  inheritance  in  the  male  line,  the  beginnings 
of  individual  property  in  slaves,  the  tightening  of 
the  marriage  bond,  accompanied  by  the  condemna- 
tion of  sundry  irregularities  heretofore  tolerated, 
are  phenomena  which  we  might  expect  to  find 
associated  together.  They  are  germs  of  the  up- 
1 Bandelier,  op.  cit.  pp.  429,  570,  620. 


124 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


per  status  of  barbarism,  as  well  as  of  tbe  earliest 
status  of  civilization  more  remotely  to  follow. 
Tbe  common  cause,  of  which  they  are  the  manifes- 
tations, is  an  increasing  sense  of  the  value  and  im- 
Aztec  prop-  portance  of  personal  property.  In  the 

erty*  Old  World  this  sense  grew  up  during  a 

pastoral  stage  of  society  such  as  the  New  World 
never  knew,  and  by  the  ages  of  Abraham  and 
Agamemnon 1 it  had  produced  results  such  as  had 
not  been  reached  in  Mexico  at  the  time  of  the 
Discovery.  Still  the  tendency  in  the  latter  coun- 
try was  in  a similar  direction.  Though  there  was 
no  notion  of  real  estate,  and  the  house  was  still 
clan-property,  yet  the  number  and  value  of  arti- 
cles of  personal  ownership  had  no  doubt  greatly 
increased  during  the  long  interval  which  must 
have  elapsed  since  the  ancestral  Mexicans  entered 
upon  the  middle  status.  The  mere  existence  of 
large  and  busy  market-places  with  regular  and 
frequent  fairs,  even  though  trade  had  scarcely  be- 
gun to  emerge  from  the  stage  of  barter,  is  suffi- 
cient proof  of  this.  Such  fairs  and  markets  do 
not  belong  to  the  Mohawk  chapter  in  human  pro- 
gress. They  imply  a considerable  number  and  di- 
versity of  artificial  products,  valued  as  articles  of 
personal  property.  A legitimate  inference  from 
them  is  the  existence  of  a certain  degree  of  luxury, 
though  doubtless  luxury  of  a barbaric  type. 

1 I here  use  these  world-famous  names  without  any  implication 
as  to  their  historical  character,  or  their  precise  date,  which  are 
in  themselves  interesting-  subjects  for  discussion.  I use  them  as 
best  symbolizing  the  state  of  society  which  existed  about  the 
northern  and  eastern  shores  of  the  eastern  Mediterranean,  several 
centuries  before  the  Olympiads. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


125 


It  is  at  this  point,  I think,  that  a judicious  critic 
will  begin  to  part  company  with  Mr.  Morgan. 
As  regards  the  outward  aspect  of  the  society 
which  the  Spaniards  found  in  Mexico,  Mr  Morgan’s 
that  eminent  scholar  more  than  once  ruleB* 
used  arguments  that  were  inconsistent  with  prin- 
ciples of  criticism  laid  down  by  himself.  At  the 
beginning  of  his  chapter  on  the  Aztec  confederacy 
Mr.  Morgan  proposed  the  following  rules : — 

“The  histories  of  Spanish  America  may  be 
trusted  in  whatever  relates  to  the  acts  of  the 
Spaniards,  and  to  the  acts  and  personal  character- 
istics of  the  Indians  ; in  whatever  relates  to  their 
weapons,  implements  and  utensils,  fabrics,  food 
and  raiment,  and  things  of  a similar  character. 

“ But  in  whatever  relates  to  Indian  society  and 
government,  their  social  relations  and  plan  of  life, 
they  are  nearly  worthless,  because  they  learned 
nothing  and  knew  nothing  of  either.  We  are  at 
full  liberty  to  reject  them  in  these  respects  and 
commence  anew ; using  any  facts  they  may  contain 
which  harmonize  with  what  is  known  of  Indian 
society.” 1 

Perhaps  it  would  have  been  better  if  the  second 
of  these  rules  had  been  somewhat  differently 
worded ; for  even  with  regard  to  the  strange  so- 
ciety and  government,  the  Spanish  writers  have 
recorded  an  immense  number  of  valuable  facts, 
without  which  Mr.  Bandelier’s  work  would  have 
been  impossible.  It  is  not  so  much  the  facts  as 
the  interpretations  of  the  Spanish  historians  that 
are  “nearly  worthless,”  and  even  their  misinter- 
1 Morgan,  Ancient  Society,  p.  186,  note. 


126 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


pretations  are  interesting  and  instructive  when 
once  we  rightly  understand  them.  Sometimes 
they  really  help  us  toward  the  truth. 

The  broad  distinction,  however,  as  stated  in 
Mr.  Morgan’s  pair  of  rules,  is  well  taken.  In  re- 
gard to  such  a strange  form  of  society  the  Span- 
ish discoverers  of  Mexico  could  not  help  making 
mistakes,  but  in  regard  to  utensils  and  dress  their 
senses  were  not  likely  to  deceive  them,  and  their 
Mr.  Morgan  statements,  according  to  Mr.  Morgan, 
SSSThff8'  may  be  trusted.  Very  good.  But  as 
“Montes-  soon  as  Mr.  Morgan  had  occasion  to 
ma’s  Dinner.”  ^fte  about  the  social  life  of  the  Az- 
tecs, he  forgot  his  own  rules  and  paid  as  little 
respect  to  the  senses  of  eye-witnesses  as  to  their 
judgment.  This  was  amusingly  illustrated  in  his 
famous  essay  on  “ Montezuma’s  Dinner.” 1 When 
Bernal  Diaz  describes  Montezuma  as  sitting  on 
a low  chair  at  a table  covered  with  a white  cloth, 
Mr.  Morgan  declares  that  it  could  not  have  been 
so,  — there  were  no  chairs  or  tables ! On  second 
thought  he  will  admit  that  there  may  have  been 
a wooden  block  hollowed  out  for  a stool,  but  in 
the  matter  of  a table  he  is  relentless.  So  when 
Cortes,  in  his  despatch  to  the  emperor,  speaks  of 
the  “ wine-cellar  ” and  of  the  presence  of  “ secre- 
taries ” at  dinner,  Mr.  Morgan  observes,  “ Since 
cursive  writing  was  unknown  among  the  Aztecs, 
the  presence  of  these  secretaries  is  an  amusing 
feature  in  the  account.  The  wine-cellar  also  is 
remarkable  for  two  reasons:  firstly,  because  the 

1 North  Amer.  Review , April,  1876.  The  substance  of  it  was 
reproduced  in  his  Houses  and  House-Life , chap.  x. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


127 


level  of  the  streets  and  courts  was  but  four  feet 
above  the  level  of  the  water,  which  made  cellars 
impossible  ; and,  secondly,  because  the  Aztecs  had 
no  knowledge  of  wine.  An  acid  beer  ( jpvlque ), 
made  by  fermenting  the  juice  of  the  maguey,  was 
a common  beverage  of  the  Aztecs ; but  it  is  hardly 
supposable  that  even  this  was  used  at  dinner.” 1 
To  this  I would  reply  that  the  fibre  of  that 
same  useful  plant  from  which  the  Aztecs  made 
their  “ beer  ” supplied  them  also  with  paper,  upon 
which  they  were  in  the  habit  of  writing,  not  in- 
deed in  cursive  characters,  but  in  hieroglyphics. 
This  kind  of  writing,  as  well  as  any  other,  ac- 
counts for  the  presence  of  secretaries,  which  seems 
to  me,  by  the  way,  a very  probable  and  character- 
istic feature  in  the  narrative.  From  the  moment 
the  mysterious  strangers  landed,  every  movement 
of  theirs  had  been  recorded  in  hieroglyphics,  and 
there  is  no  reason  why  notes  of  what  they  said 
and  did  should  not  have  been  taken  at  dinner. 
As  for  the  place  where  the  ‘pulque  was  kept,  it 
was  a venial  slip  of  the  pen  to  call  it  a “ wine-cel- 
lar,” even  if  it  was  not  below  the  ground.  The 
language  of  Cortes  does  not  imply  that  he  visited 
the  “ cellar ; ” he  saw  a crowd  of  Indians  drinking 
the  beverage,  and  supposing  the  great  house  he 
was  in  to  be  Montezuma’s,  he  expressed  his  sense 
of  that  person’s  hospitality  by  saying  that  “his 
wine-cellar  was  open  to  all.”  And  really,  is  it  not 
rather  a captious  criticism  which  in  one  breath 
chides  Cortes  for  calling  the  beverage  “wine,” 
and  in  the  next  breath  goes  on  to  call  it  “ beer  ” ? 

1 Houses  and  House-Life , p.  241. 


128 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  pulque  was  neither  the  one  nor  the  other ; 
for  want  of  any  other  name  a German  might  have 
called  it  beer,  a Spaniard  would  be  more  likely  to 
call  it  wine.  And  why  is  it  “ hardly  supposable  ” 
that  pulque  was  used  at  dinner?  Why  should 
Mr.  Morgan,  who  never  dined  with  Montezuma, 
know  so  much  more  about  such  things  than  Cortes 
and  Bernal  Diaz,  who  did  ? 1 

The  Spanish  statements  of  facts  are,  of  course, 
not  to  be  accepted  uncritically.  When  we  are 
told  of  cut  slabs  of  porphyry  inlaid  in  the  walls 

of  a room,  we  have  a right  to  inquire 

The  reaction  ° A 

against  uncrit-  how  so  hard  a stone  could  be  cut  with 

ical  and  ex- 
aggerated flint  or  copper  chisels,2  and  are  ready 

statements.  oA  A # J 

to  entertam  the  suggestion  that  some 
other  stone  might  easily  have  been  mistaken  for 
porphyry.  Such  a critical  inquiry  is  eminently 
profitable,  and  none  the  less  so  when  it  brings  us 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  Aztecs  did  succeed  in 
cutting  porphyry.  Again,  when  we  read  about 
Indian  armies  of  200,000  men,  pertinent  questions 
arise  as  to  the  commissariat,  and  we  are  led  to  re- 
flect that  there  is  nothing  about  which  old  soldiers 
spin  such  unconscionable  yarns  as  about  the  size 

1 Mr.  Andrew  Lang  asks  some  similar  questions  in  his  Myth , 
Ritual,  and  Religion,  vol.  ii.  p.  349,  but  in  a tone  of  impatient 
contempt  which,  as  applied  to  a man  of  Mr.  Morgan’s  calibre,  is 
hardly  becoming. 

2 For  an  excellent  account  of  ancient  Mexican  knives  and 
chisels,  see  Dr.  Valentini’s  paper  on  “ Semi-Lunar  and  Crescent- 
Shaped  Tools,”  in  Proceedings  of  Amer.  Antiq.  Soc.,  New  Series, 
vol.  iii.  pp.  449-474.  Compare  the  very  interesting  Spanish 
observations  on  copper  hatchets  and  flint  chisels  in  Clavigero, 
Historia  antigua,  tom.  i.  p.  242 ; Mendieta,  Historia  ecclesiastica 
Indiana,  tom.  iv.  cap.  xii. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


129 


of  the  armies  they  have  thrashed.  In  a fairy  tale, 
of  course,  such  suggestions  are  impertinent ; things 
can  go  on  anyhow.  In  real  life  it  is  different.  The 
trouble  with  most  historians  of  the  conquest  of 
Mexico  has  been  that  they  have  made  it  like  a 
fairy  tale,  and  the  trouble  with  Mr.  Morgan  was 
that,  in  a wholesome  and  much-needed  spirit  of 
reaction,  he  was  too  much  inclined  to  dismiss  the 
whole  story  as  such.  He  forgot  the  first  of  his 
pair  of  rules,  and  applied  the  second  to  everything 
alike.  He  felt  “at  full  liberty  to  reject”  the 
testimony  of  the  discoverers  as  to  what  they  saw 
and  tasted,  and  to  “commence  anew,”  reasoning 
from  “what  is  known  of  Indian  society.”  And 
here  Mr.  Morgan’s  mind  was  so  full  of  the  kind 
of  Indian  society  which  he  knew  more  minutely 
and  profoundly  than  any  other  man,  that  he  was 
apt  to  forget  that  there  could  be  any  other  kind. 
He  overlooked  his  own  distinction  between  the 
lower  and  middle  periods  of  barbarism  in  his  at- 
tempt Jto  ignore  or  minimize  the  points  of  differ- 
ence between  Aztecs  and  Iroquois.1  In  this  way 
he  did  injustice  to  his  own  brilliant  and  useful 
classification  of  stages  of  culture,  and  in  particular 
to  the  middle  period  of  barbarism,  the  significance 
of  which  he  was  the  first  to  detect,  but  failed  to 
realize  fully  because  his  attention  had  been  so  in- 
tensely concentrated  upon  the  lower  period. 

1 It  often  happens  that  the  followers  of  a great  man  are  more 
likely  to  run  to  extremes  than  their  master,  as,  for  example,  when 
we  see  the  queen  of  pueblos  rashly  described  as  “ a collection  of 
mud  huts,  such  as  Cortes  found  and  dignified  with  the  name  of  a 
city.”  Smithsonian  Report , 1887,  part  i.  p.  691.  This  is  quite 
inadmissible. 


130 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


In  truth,  the  middle  period  of  barbarism  was 
one  of  the  most  important  periods  in  the  career 
of  the  human  race,  and  full  of  fascination  to  the 
importance  of  st‘ udent,  as  the  unfading  interest  in  an- 
periS ofbar-  °ient  Mexico  and  the  huge  mass  of  lit- 
bansm.  erature  devoted  to  it  show.  It  spanned 
the  interval  between  such  society  as  that  of  Hia- 
watha and  such  as  that  of  the  Odyssey.  One 
more  such  interval  (and,  I suspect,  a briefer  one, 
because  the  use  of  iron  and  the  development  of 
inheritable  wealth  would  accelerate  progress)  led 
to  the  age  that  could  write  the  Odyssey,  one  of 
the  most  beautiful  productions  of  the  human  mind. 
If  Mr.  Morgan  had  always  borne  in  mind  that,  on 
his  own  classification,  Montezuma  must  have  been 
at  least  as  near  to  Agamemnon  as  to  Powhatan, 
his  attitude  toward  the  Spanish  historians  would 
have  been  less  hostile.  A Moqui  pueblo  stands 
near  the  lower  end  of  the  middle  period  of  bar- 
barism ; ancient  Troy  stood  next  the  upper  end. 
Mr.  Morgan  found  apt  illustrations  in  the  former ; 
perhaps  if  he  had  lived  long  enough  to  profit  by 
the  work  of  Schliemann  and  Bandelier,  he  might 
have  found  equally  apt  ones  in  the  latter.  Mr. 
Bandelier’s  researches  certainly  show  that  the  an- 
cient city  of  Mexico,  in  point  of  social  develop- 
ment, stood  somewhere  between  the  two. 

How  that  city  looked  may  best  be  described 
when  we  come  to  tell  what  its  first  Spanish  vis- 
itors saw.  Let  it  suffice  here  to  say  that,  upon  a 
reasonable  estimate  of  their  testimony,  pleasure- 
gardens,  menageries  and  aviaries,  fountains  and 
baths,  tessellated  marble  floors,  finely  wrought  pot- 


ANCIENT  AMERICA . 


181 


tery,  exquisite  feather-work,  brilliant  mats  and 
tapestries,  silver  goblets,  dainty  spices  burning  in 
golden  censers,  varieties  of  highly  seasoned  dishes, 
dramatic  performances,  jugglers  and  acrobats,  bal- 
lad singers  and  dancing  girls,  — such  things  were 
to  be  seen  in  this  city  of  snake-worshipping  canni- 
bals. It  simulated  civilization  as  a tree-fern  simu- 
lates a tree. 

In  its  general  outlines  the  account  here  given  of 
Aztec  society  and  government  at  the  time  of  the 
Discovery  will  probably  hold  true  of  all  the  semi- 
civilized  communities  of  the  Mexican  peninsula 
and  Central  America.  The  pueblos  of  Mexico 
were  doubtless  of  various  grades  of  size,  strength, 
and  comfort,  ranging  from  such  structures  as  Zuni 
up  to  the  city  of  Mexico.  The  cities  Meiicwl8  and 
of  Chiapas,  Yucatan,  and  Guatemala,  Maya8, 
whose  ruins,  in  those  tropical  forests,  are  so  im- 
pressive; probably  belong  to  the  same  class.  The 
Maya-Quiche  tribes,  who  dwelt  and  still  dwell  in 
this  region,  were  different  in  stock-language  from 
their  neighbours  of  Mexico ; but  there  are  strong 
reasons  for  believing  that  the  two  great  groups, 
Mexicans  and  Mayas,  arose  from  the  expansion 
and  segmentation  of  one  common  stock,  and  there 
is  no  doubt  as  to  the  very  close  similarity  be- 
tween the  two  in  government,  religion,  and  social 
advancement.  In  some  points  the  Mayas  were 
superior.  They  possessed  a considerable  liters 
ture,  written  in  highly  developed  hieroglyphic 
characters  upon  maguey  paper  and  upon  deerskin 
parchment,  so  that  from  this  point  of  view  they 


132 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


stood  upon  the  threshold  of  civilization  as  strictly- 
defined.1  But,  like  the  Mexicans,  they  were  igno- 

1 This  writing  was  at  once  recognized  by  learned  Spaniards, 
like  Las  Casas,  as  entirely  different  from  anything  found  else- 
where in  America.  He  found  in  Yucatan  “letreros  de  ciertos 
caracteres  que  en  otra  ninguna  parte,”  Las  Casas,  Historia  apo- 
logttica,  cap.  cxxiii.  For  an  account  of  the  hieroglyphics,  see  the 
learned  essays  of  Dr.  Cyrus  Thomas,  A Study  of  the  Manuscript 
Troano,  Washington,  1882 ; “ Notes  on  certain  Maya  and  Mexican 
MSS.,”  Third  Report  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology , pp.  7-153 ; “ Aids 
to  the  Study  of  the  Maya  Codices,”  Sixth  Report , pp.  259-371. 
(The  paper  last  mentioned  ends  with  the  weighty  words,  “ The 
more  I study  these  characters  the  stronger  becomes  the  convic- 
tion that  they  have  grown  out  of  a pictographic  system  similar  to 
that  common  among  the  Indians  of  North  America.”  Exactly 
so ; and  this  is  typical  of  every  aspect  and  every  detail  of  ancient 
American  culture.  It  is  becoming  daily  more  evident  that  the 
old  notion  of  an  influence  from  Asia  has  not  a leg  to  stand  on.) 
See  also  a suggestive  paper  by  the  astronomer,  E.  S.  Holden, 
“ Studies  in  Central  American  Picture-Writing,”  First  Report  of 
the  Bureau  of  Ethnology , pp.  205-245  ; Brinton,  Ancient  Phonetic 
Alphabet  of  Yucatan,  New  York,  1870 ; Essays  of  an  Americanist , 
Philadelphia,  1890,  pp.  193-304 ; L£on  de  Rosny,  Les  ecritures 
figuratives , Paris,  1870 , L' interpretation  des  anciens  textes  Mayas, 
Paris,  1875 ; Essai  sur  le  dichiffrement  de  Vicriture  hiiratique  de 
VAmirique  Centrale,  Paris,  1876 ; Forstemann,  Erlduterungen  der 
Maya  Handschrift,  Dresden,  1886.  The  decipherment  is  as  yet 
but  partially  accomplished.  The  Meidcan  system  of  writing  is 
clearly  developed  from  the  ordinary  Indian  pictographs  ; it  could 
not  have  arisen  from  the  Maya  system,  but  the  latter  might  well 
have  been  a further  development  of  the  Mexican  system ; the 
Maya  system  had  probably  developed  some  characters  with  a 
phonetic  value,  i.  e.  was  groping  toward  the  alphabetical  stage ; 
but  how  far  this  groping  had  gone  must  remain  very  doubtful 
until  the  decipherment  has  proceeded  further.  Dr.  Isaac  Taylor 
is  too  hasty  in  saying  that  “the  Mayas  employed  twenty-seven 
characters  which  must  be  admitted  to  be  alphabetic”  (Taylor, 
The  Alphabet,  vol.  i.  p.  24) ; this  statement  is  followed  by  the 
conclusion  that  the  Maya  system  of  writing  was  “superior  in 
simplicity  and  convenience  to  that  employed  ...  by  the  great 
Assyrian  nation  at  the  epoch  of  its  greatest  power  and  glory.” 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


133 


rant  of  iron,  their  society  was  organized  upon  the 
principle  of  gentilism,  they  were  cannibals  and 
sacrificed  men  and  women  to  idols,  some  of  which 
were  identical  with  those  of  Mexico.  The  Mayas 
had  no  conception  of  property  in  land ; their 

_ N 


an±±±±±±±±±±di3  i 

264  FT 


Ground-plan  of  so-called  “House  of  the  Nuns”  at  Uxmal. 


buildings  were  great  communal  houses,  like  pueb- 
los ; in  some  cases  these  so-called  palaces,  at  first 
supposed  to  be  scanty  remnants  of  vast  cities,  were 
themselves  the  entire  “ cities ; ” in  other  cases 

Dr.  Taylor  has  been  misled  by  Diego  de  Landa,  whose  work 
( Relation  des  choses  de  V Yucatan,  ed.  Brasseur,  Paris,  1864)  has 
in  it  some  pitfalls  for  the  unwary. 


134  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


there  were  doubtless  large  composite  pueblos  fit 
to  be  called  cities. 

These  noble  ruins  have  excited  great  and  in- 
creasing interest  since  the  publication  of  Mr.  Ste- 
phens’s charming  book  just  fifty  years  ago.1  An 
air  of  profound  mystery  surrounded  them,  and 
many  wild  theories  were  propounded  to  account 

Ruined  cities  ^ or  ^eir  existence.  They  were  at  first 
of  central  accredited  with  a fabulous  antiquity, 

America.  1 . 1 . A J 1 

and  m at  least  one  instance  this  notion 
was  responsible  for  what  must  be  called  misrepre- 
sentation, if  not  humbug.2  Having  been  placed 

1 Stephens,  Incidents  of  Travel  in  Central  America , Chiapas , 
and  Yucatan , 2 vols.,  New  York,  1841. 

2 It  occurred  in  the  drawings  of  the  artist  Frederic  de  Wal- 
deck,  who  visited  Palenque  before  Stephens,  hut  whose  re- 
searches were  published  later.  “His  drawings,”  says  Mr.  Winsor, 
“ are  exquisite ; but  he  was  not  free  from  a tendency  to  improve 
and  restore,  where  the  conditions  gave  a hint,  and  so  as  we  have 
them  in  the  final  publication  they  have  not  been  accepted  as 
wholly  trustworthy.”  Narr.  and  Crit.  Hist.,  i.  194.  M.  de  Char- 
nay  puts  it  more  strongly.  Upon  his  drawing  of  a certain  panel 
at  Palenque,  M.  de  Waldeck  “ has  seen  fit  to  place  three  or  four 
elephants.  What  end  did  he  propose  to  himself  in  giving  this 
fictitious  representation  ? Presumably  to  give  a prehistoric  origin 
to  these  ruins,  since  it  is  an  ascertained  fact  that  elephants  in  a 
fossil  state  only  have  been  found  on  the  American  continent.  It 
is  needless  to  add  that  neither  Catherwood,  who  drew  these  in- 
scriptions most  minutely,  nor  myself  who  brought  impressions  of 
them  away,  nor  living  man,  ever  saw  these  elephants  and  their 
fine  trunks.  But  such  is  the  mischief  engendered  by  precon- 
ceived opinions.  With  some  writers  it  would  seem  that  to  give 
a recent  date  to  these  monuments  would  deprive  them  of  all  in- 
terest. It  would  have  been  fortunate  had  explorers  been  imbued 
with  fewer  prejudices  and  gifted  with  a little  more  common  sense, 
for  then  we  should  have  known  the  truth  with  regard  to  these 
ruins  long  since.”  Charnay,  The  Ancient  Cities  of  the  New 
World , London,  1887,  p.  248.  The  gallant  explorer’s  indigna- 
tion is  certainly  quite  pardonable. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


135 


by  popular  fancy  at  such  a remote  age,  they  were 
naturally  supposed  to  have  been  built,  not  by  the 
Mayas, — who  still  inhabit  Yucatan  and  do  not 
absolutely  dazzle  us  with  their  exalted  civilization, 
— but  by  some  wonderful  people  long  since  van- 
ished. Now  as  to  this  point  the  sculptured  slabs 
of  Uxmal  and  Chichen-Itza  tell  their  own  story. 
They  are  covered  with  hieroglyphic  inscriptions, 
and  these  hieroglyphs  are  the  same  as  those  in 
which  the  Dresden  Codex  and  other  Maya  manu- 
scripts still  preserved  are  written ; though  their 
decipherment  is  not  yet  complete,  there  is  no  sort 
of  doubt  as  to  their  being  written  in  the  Maya 
characters.  Careful  inspection,  moreover,  shows 
that  the  buildings  in  which  these  inscriptions  oc- 
cur are  not  so  very  ancient.  Mr.  Stephens,  who 
was  one  of  their  earliest  as  well  as  sanest  ex- 
plorers, believed  them  to  be  the  work  of  the 
Mayas  a p a comparatively  recent  period.1  The 
notion  of  their,  antiquity  was  perhaps  suggested 
by  the  belief  that  certain  colossal  mahogany  trees 

1 Some  of  his  remarks  are  worth  quoting  in  detail,  especially 
in  view  of  the  time  when  they  were  written:  “I  repeat  my 
opinion  that  we  are  not  warranted  in  going  hack  to  any  ancient 
nation  of  the  Old  World  for  the  builders  of  these  cities ; that  they 
are  not  the  work  of  people  who  have  passed  away  and  whose  his- 
tory is  lost,  hut  that  there  are  strong  reasons  to  believe  them  the 
creations  of  the  same  races  who  inhabited  the  country  at  the  time 
of  the  Spanish  conquest,  or  some  not  very  distant  progenitors. 
And  I would  remark  that  we  began  our  exploration  without  any 
theory  to  support.  . • . Some  are  beyond  doubt  older  than  others ; 
some  are  known  to  have  been  inhabited  at  the  time  of  the  Span- 
ish conquest,  and  others,  perhaps,  were  really  in  ruins  before  ; . . . 
hut  in  regard  to  Uxmal,  at  least,  we  believe  that  it  was  an  exist- 
ing and  inhabited  city  at  the  time  of  the  arrival  of  the  Spaniards.” 
Stephens,  Central  America,  etc.,  vol.  ii.  p.  455. 


136 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


growing  between  and  over  the  ruins  at  Palenque 
must  be  nearly  2,000  years  old.  But  when  M.  de 
Charnay  visited  Palenque  in  1859  be  bad  the  east- 
ern side  of  the  “palace”  cleared  of  its  dense 
vegetation  in  order  to  get  a good  photograph; 
and  when  he  revisited  the  spot  in  1881  he  found 
a sturdy  growth  of  young  mahogany  the  age  of 
which  he  knew  did  not  exceed  twenty-two  years. 
Instead  of  making  a ring  once  a year,  as  in  our 
sluggish  and  temperate  zone,  these  trees  had  made 
rings  at  the  rate  of  about  one  in  a month ; their 
trunks  were  already  more  than  two  feet  in  di- 
ameter ; judging  from  this  rate  of  growth  the  big- 
gest giant  on  the  place  need  not  have  been  more 
than  200  years  old,  if  as  much.1 

These  edifices  are  not  so  durably  constructed  as 
those  which  in  Europe  have  stood  for  more  than 
a thousand  years.  They  do  not  indicate  a high 
civilization  on  the  part  of  their  builders.  They 
do  not,  as  Mr.  Andrew  Lang  says,  “ throw  My- 
cenae into  the  shade,  and  rival  the  re- 
abiy^iwt  older"  mains  of  Cambodia.” 2 In  pictures 

t/hsm  th6  _ i i j "TiiT  i 

twelfth  cen-  they  may  seem  to  do  so,  but  M.  de 
Charnay,  after  close  and  repeated  ex- 
amination of  these  buildings,  assures  us  that  as 
structures  they  “cannot  be  compared  with  those 
at  Cambodia,  which  belong  to  nearly  the  same 
period,  the  twelfth  century,  and  which,  notwith- 
standing their  greater  and  more  resisting  propor- 
tions, are  found  in  the  same  dilapidated  condi- 

1 Charnay,  The  Ancient  Cities  of  the  New  World,  p.  260. 

2 Lang,  Myth,  Ritual , and  Religion,  vol.  ii.  p.  348. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


137 


tion.” 1 It  seems  to  me  that  if  Mr.  Lang  had 
spoken  of  the  Yucatan  ruins  as  rivalling  the  re- 
mains of  Mycenae,  instead  of  “ throwing  them  into 
the  shade,”  he  would  have  come  nearer  the  mark. 
The  builders  of  Uxmal,  like  those  of  Mycenae,  did 
not  understand  the  principle  of  the  arch,  but  were 
feeling  their  way  toward  it.2  And  here  again  we 
are  brought  back,  as  seems  to  happen  whatever 
road  we  follow,  to  the  middle  status  of  barbarism. 
The  Yucatan  architecture  shows  the  marks  of  its 
origin  in  the  adobe  and  rubble-stone  work  of  the 
New  Mexico  pueblos.  The  inside  of  the  wall  “ is 
a rude  mixture  of  friable  mortar  and  small  irregu- 
lar stones,”  and  under  the  pelting  tropical  rains 
the  dislocation  of  the  outer  facing  is  presently  ef- 
fected. The  large  blocks,  cut  with  flint  chisels, 
are  of  a soft  stone  that  is  soon  damaged  by 
weather ; and  the  cornices  and  lintels  are  beams 
of  a very  hard  wood,  yet  not  so  hard  but  that  in- 
sects bore  into  it.  From  such  considerations  it  is 
justly  inferred  that  the  highest  probable  antiquity 
for  most  of  the  ruins  in  Yucatan  or  Central  Amer- 
ica is  the  twelfth  or  thirteenth  century  of  our  era.3 
Some,  perhaps,  may  be  no  older  than  the  ancient 
city  of  Mexico,  built  a.  d.  1325. 

1 Charnay,  op.  cit.  p.  209.  “ I may  remark  that  [the]  virgin 

forests  [here]  have  no  very  old  trees,  being  destroyed  by  insects, 
moisture,  lianas,  etc. ; and  old  monteros  tell  me  that  mahogany 
and  cedar  trees,  which  are  most  durable,  do  not  live  above  200 
years,”  id.  p.  447. 

2 The  reader  will  find  it  suggestive  to  compare  portions  of 
Schliemann’s  Mycence  and  M.  de  Charnay’ s book,  just  cited,  with 
Morgan’s  Houses  and  House-Life,  chap.  xi. 

3 Charnay,  op.  cit.  p.  411.  Copan  and  Palenque  may  be  two  or 
three  centuries  older,  and  had  probably  fallen  into  ruins  before 
the  arrival  of  the  Spaniards. 


138 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


But  we  are  no  longer  restricted  to  purely  ar- 
chaeological evidence.  One  of  the  most  impressive 
of  all  these  ruined  cities  is  Chichen-Itza,  which  is 
regarded  as  older  than  Uxmal,  but  not  so  old  as 
Izamal.  Now  in  recent  times  sundry  old  Maya 
Chronicle  of  documents  have  been  discovered  in 
Chicxuiub.  Yucatan,  and  among  them  is  a brief 
history  of  the  Spanish  conquest  of  that  country, 
written  in  the  Roman  character  by  a native  chief, 
Nakuk  Pech,  about  1562.  It  has  been  edited, 
with  an  English  translation,  by  that  zealous  and 
indefatigable  scholar,  to  whom  American  philol- 
ogy owes  such  a debt  of  gratitude,  — Dr.  Daniel 
Brinton.  This  chronicle  tells  us  several  things 
that  we  did  not  know  before,  and,  among  others, 
it  refers  most  explicitly  to  Chichen-Itza  and  Iza- 
mal as  inhabited  towns  during  the  time  that  the 
Spaniards  were  coming,  from  1519  to  1542.  If 
there  could  have  been  any  lingering  doubt  as  to 
the  correctness  of  the  views  of  Stephens,  Morgan, 
and  Charnay,  this  contemporaneous  documentary 
testimony  dispels  it  once  for  all.1 

1 Brinton,  The  Maya  Chronicles , Philadelphia,  1882,  “ Chron- 
icle of  Chicxuiub,’  ’ pp.  187-259.  This  book  is  of  great  impor- 
tance, and  for  the  ancient  history  of  Guatemala  Brinton’s  Annals 
of  the  Cakchiquels,  Philadelphia,  1885,  is  of  like  value  and  in- 
terest. 

Half  a century  ago  Mr.  Stephens  wrote  in  truly  prophetic  vein, 
“ the  convents  are  rich  in  manuscripts  and  documents  written  by 
the  early  fathers,  caciques,  and  Indians,  who  very  soon  acquired 
the  knowledge  of  Spanish  and  the  art  of  writing.  These  have 
never  been  examined  with  the  slightest  reference  to  this  subject ; 
and  I cannot  help  thinking  that  some  precious  memorial  is  now 
mouldering  in  the  library  of  a neighbouring  convent , which  would 
determine  the  history  of  some  one  of  these  ruined  cities .”  Vol.  ii.  p. 
456.  The  italicizing,  of  course,  is  mine. 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


139 


The  Mexicans  and  Mayas  believed  themselves 
to  be  akin  to  each  other,  they  had  several  deities 
and.  a large  stock  of  traditional  lore  in  common, 
and  there  was  an  essential  similarity  in  culture 
their  modes  of  life;  so  that,  since  we 
are  now  assured  that  such  cities  as  Iza-  Meilcan' 
mal  and  Chichen-Itza  were  contemporary  with  the 
city  of  Mexico,  we  shall  probably  not  go  very  far 
astray  if  we  assume  that  the  elaborately  carved  and 
bedizened  ruins  of  the  former  may  give  us  some 
hint  as  to  how  things  might  have  looked  in  the  lat- 
ter. Indeed  this  complicated  and  grotesque  carv- 
ing on  walls,  door-posts,  and  lintels  was  one  of  the 
first  things  to  attract  the  attention  of  the  Spaniards 
in  Mexico.  They  regarded  it  with  mingled  indig- 
nation and  awe,  for  serpents,  coiled  or  uncoiled, 
with  gaping  mouths,  were  most  conspicuous  among 
the  objects  represented.  The  visitors  soon  learned 
that  all  this  had  a symbolic  and  religious  meaning, 
and  with  some  show  of  reason  they  concluded  that 
this  strange  people  worshipped  the  Devil. 

We  have  now  passed  in  review  the  various  peo- 
ples of  North  America,  from  the  Arctic  circle  to 
the  neighbourhood  of  the  isthmus  of  Darien,  and 
can  form  some  sort  of  a mental  picture  of  the  con- 
tinent at  the  time  of  its  discovery  by  Europeans 
in  the  fifteenth  century.  Much  more  might  have 
been  said  without  going  beyond  the  requirements 
of  an  outline  sketch,  but  quite  as  much  has  been 
said  as  is  consistent  with  the  general  plan  of  this 
book.  I have  not  undertaken  at  present  to  go  be- 
yond the  isthmus  of  Darien,  because  this  prelim- 


140 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


inary  chapter  is  already  disproportionately  long, 
and  after  this  protracted  discussion  the  reader’s 
attention  may  he  somewhat  relieved  by  an  entire 
change  of  scene.  Enough  has  been  set  forth  to 
explain  the  narrative  that  follows,  and  to  justify 
us  henceforth  in  taking  certain  things  for  granted. 
The  outline  description  of  Mexico  will  be  completed 
when  we  come  to  the  story  of  its  conquest  by  Span- 
iards, and  then  we  shall  be  ready  to  describe  some 
principal  features  of  Peruvian  society  and  to  under- 
stand how  the  Spaniards  conquered  that  country. 

There  is,  however,  one  conspicuous  feature  of 
North  American  antiquity  which  has  not  yet  re- 
ceived our  attention,  and  which  calls  for  a few 
words  before  we  close  this  chapter.  I refer  to  the 
The  “Mound-  mounds  that  are  scattered  over  so  large 
Builders.”  a part  of  the  soil  of  the  United  States, 
and  more  particularly  to  those  between  the  Mis- 
sissippi river  and  the  Alleghany  mountains,  which 
have  been  the  subject  of  so  much  theorizing,  and 
in  late  years  of  so  much  careful  study.1  Vague 

1 For  original  researches  in  the  mounds  one  cannot  do  better 
than  consult  the  following  papers  in  the  Reports  of  the  Bureau  of 
Ethnology : — 1.  by  W.  H.  Holmes,  “Art  in  Shell  of  the  An- 
cient Americans,”  ii.  181-305;  “The  Ancient  Pottery  of  the 
Mississippi  Valley,”  iv.  365-436 ; “ Prehistoric  Textile  Fabrics 
of  the  United  States,”  iii.  397-431 ; followed  by  an  illustrated 
catalogue  of  objects  collected  chiefly  from  mounds,  iii.  433-515  ; 
— 2.  H.  W.  Henshaw,  “ Animal  Carvings  from  the  Mounds  of  the 
Mississippi  Valley,”  ii.  121-166  ; — 3.  Cyrus  Thomas,  “ Burial 
Mounds  of  the  Northern  Section  of  the  United  States,”  v.  7-119  ; 
also  three  of  the  Bureau’s  “Bulletins”  by  Dr.  Thomas,  “The 
Problem  of  the  Ohio  Mounds,”  “ The  Circular,  Square,  and  Oc- 
tagonal Earthworks  of  Ohio,”  and  “ Work  in  Mound  Exploration 
of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology ; ” also  two  articles  by  Dr.  Thomas 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


141 


and  wild  were  the  speculations  once  rife  about 
the  “ Mound-Builders  ” and  their  wonderful  civil- 
ization. They  were  supposed  to  have  been  a race 
quite  different  from  the  red  men,  with  a culture 
perhaps  superior  to  our  own,  and  more  or  less  elo- 
quence was  wasted  over  the  vanished  “ empire” 
of  the  mound-builders.  There  is  no  reason,  how- 
ever, for  supposing  that  there  ever  was  an  empire 
of  any  sort  in  ancient  North  America,  and  no  relic 
of  the  past  has  ever  been  seen  at  any  spot  on  our 
planet  which  indicates  the  former  existence  of  a 
vanished  civilization  even  remotely  approaching 
our  own.  The  sooner  the  student  of  history  gets 
his  head  cleared  of  all  such  rubbish,  the  better. 
As  for  the  mounds,  which  are  scattered  in  such 
profusion  over  the  country  west  of  the  Allegha- 
nies,  there  are  some  which  have  been  built  by  In- 
in the  Magazine  of  American  History : — “ The  Houses  of  the 
Mound-Builders,”  xi.  110-115;  “Indian  Tribes  in  Prehistoric 
Times,”  xx.  193-201.  See  also  Horatio  Hale,  “Indian  Migra- 
tions,” in  American  Antiquarian , v.  18-28, 108-124 ; M.  F.  Force, 
To  What  Race  did  the  Mound-Builders  belong  ? Cincinnati,  1875 ; 
Lucien  Carr,  Mounds  of  the  Mississippi  Valley  historically  con- 
sidered, 1883 ; Nadaillac’s  Prehistoric  America , ed.  W.  H.  Dali, 
chaps,  iii.,  iv.  The  earliest  work  of  fundamental  importance  on 
the  subject  was  Squier’s  Ancient  Monuments  of  the  Mississippi 
Valley , Philadelphia,  1848,  being  the  first  volume  of  the  Smith- 
sonian Contributions  to  Knowledge.  — For  statements  of  the 
theory  which  presumes  either  a race  connection  or  a similarity  in 
culture  between  the  mound-builders  and  the  pueblo  Indians,  see 
Dawson,  Fossil  Men,  p.  55 ; Foster,  Prehistoric  Races  of  the 
United  States,  Chicago,  1873,  chaps.  iii.,v.-x. ; Sir  Daniel  Wilson, 
Prehistoric  Man,  chap.  x.  The  annual  Smithsonian  Reports  for 
thirty  years  past  illustrate  the  growth  of  knowledge  and  progres- 
sive changes  of  opinion  on  the  subject.  The  bibliographical  ac- 
count in  Winsor’s  Narr.  and  Crit.  Hist.,  i.  397-412,  is  full  of 
minute  information. 


142 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


dians  since  the  arrival  of  white  men  in  America, 
and  which  contain  knives  and  trinkets  of  Euro- 
pean manufacture.  There  are  many  others  which 
are  much  older,  and  in  which  the  genuine  remains 
sometimes  indicate  a culture  like  that  of  Shawnees 
or  Senecas,  and  sometimes  suggest  something  per- 
haps a little  higher.  With  the  progress  of  re- 
search the  vast  and  vague  notion  of  a distinct 
race  of  “ Mound-Builders  ” became  narrowed  and 
The  notion  defined.  It  began  to  seem  probable 
like  the  Az-Gre  that  the  builders  of  the  more  remark- 
tecs;  able  mounds  were  tribes  of  Indians 

who  had  advanced  beyond  the  average  level  in 
horticulture,  and  consequently  in  density  of  popu- 
lation, and  perhaps  in  political  and  priestly  organ- 
ization. Such  a conclusion  seemed  to  be  supported 
by  the  size  of  some  of  the  “ ancient  garden-beds,” 
often  covering  more  than  a hundred  acres,  filled 
with  the  low  parallel  ridges  in  which  corn  was 
planted.  The  mound  people  were  thus  supposed 
to  be  semi-civilized  red  men,  like  the  Aztecs,  and 
some  of  their  elevated  earthworks  were  explained 
as  places  for  human  sacrifice,  like  the  pyramids  of 
Mexico  and  Central  America.  It  was  thought 
that  the  64  civilization  ” of  the  Cordilleran  peoples 
might  formerly  have  extended  northward  and  east- 
ward into  the  Mississippi  valley,  and  might  after 
a while  have  been  pushed  back  by  powerful  hordes 
of  more  barbarous  invaders.  A further  modification 
and  reduction  of  this  theory  likened  the  mound- 
builders  to  the  pueblo  Indians  of  New  Mexico. 
Such  was  the  opinion  of  Mr.  Morgan,  who  of- 
fered a very  ingenious  explanation  of  the  extensive 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


143 


earthworks  at  High  Bank,  in  Ross  county,  Ohio, 
as  the  fortified  site  of  a pueblo.1  Although  there 
is  no  reason  for  supposing  that  the  mound-build- 
ers practised  irrigation  (which  would  not  be  re- 
quired in  the  Mississippi  valley)  or  used  adobe- 
brick,  yet  Mr.  Morgan  was  inclined  to  admit  them 
into  his  middle  status  of  barbarism  be-  or  Uke  the 
cause  of  the  copper  hatchets  and  chisels  Zu2ifl' 
found  in  some  of  the  mounds,  and  because  of  the 
apparent  superiority  in  horticulture  and  the  in- 
creased reliance  upon  it.  He  suggested  that  a 
people  somewhat  like  the  Zunis  might  have  mi- 
grated eastward  and  modified  their  building  hab- 
its to  suit  the  altered  conditions  of  the  Mississippi 
valley,  where  they  dwelt  for  several  centuries, 
until  at  last,  for  some  unknown  reason,  they  re- 
tired to  the  Rocky  Mountain  region.  It  seems  to 
me  that  an  opinion  just  the  reverse  of  Mr.  Mor- 
gan’s would  be  more  easily  defensible,  — namely, 
that  the  ancestors  of  the  pueblo  Indians  were  a 
people  of  building  habits  somewhat  similar  to  the 
Mandans,  and  that  their  habits  became  modified 
in  adaptation  to  a country  which  demanded  care- 
ful irrigation  and  supplied  adobe-clay  in  abun- 
dance. If  ever  they  built  any  of  the  mounds  in 
the  Mississippi  valley,  I should  be  disposed  to 
place  their  mound-building  period  before  their 
pueblo  period. 

Recent  researches,  however,  make  it  more  and 
more  improbable  that  the  mound-builders  were 
nearly  akin  to  such  people  as  the  Zunis  or  similar 
to  them  in  grade  of  culture.  Of  late  years  the  ex- 

1 Houses  and  House-Life , chap.  ix. 


144 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


ploration  of  the  mounds  has  been  carried  on  with 
increasing  diligence.  More  than  2,000  mounds 
have  been  opened,  and  at  least  88,000  ancient 
relics  have  been  gathered  from  them : such  as 
quartzite  arrow-heads  and  spades,  greenstone  axes 
and  hammers,  mortars  and  pestles,  tools  for  spin- 
ning and  weaving,  and  cloth,  made  of  spun  thread 
and  woven  with  warp  and  woof,  somewhat  like  a 
coarse  sail-cloth.  The  water-jugs,  kettles,  pipes, 
and  sepulchral  urns  have  been  elaborately  studied. 
The  net  results  of  all  this  investigation,  up  to  the 
present  time,  have  been  concisely  summed  up  by 
Dr.  Cyrus  Thomas.1  The  momids  were 

were  probably  not  all  built  by  Olie  people,  but  by  dif- 
ferent peoples  ferent  tribes  as  clearly  distinguishable 

in  the  lower  _ ..  ^ . 0 . 

status  of  bar-  irom  one  another  as  Algonqums  are 
distinguishable  from  Iroquois.  These 
mound-building  tribes  were  not  superior  in  cul- 
ture to  the  Iroquois  and  many  of  the  Algonquins 
as  first  seen  by  white  men.  They  are  not  to  be 
classified  with  Zunis,  still  less  with  Mexicans  or 
Mayas,  in  point  of  culture,  but  with  Shawnees 
and  Cherokees.  Nay  more,  — some  of  them  were 
Shawnees  and  Cherokees.  The  missionary  Johann 
Heckewelder  long  ago  published  the  Lenape  tradi- 
tion of  the  Tallegwi  or  Allighewi  people,  who  have 
left  their  name  upon  the  Alleghany  river  and 
mountains.2  The  Tallegwi  have  been  identified 

1 Work  in  Mound  Exploration  of  the  Bureau  of  Ethnology , 
Washington,  1887.  For  a sight  of  the  thousands  of  objects 
gathered  from  the  mounds,  one  should  visit  the  Peabody  Mu- 
seum at  Cambridge  and  the  Smithsonian  Institution  at  Washing- 
ton. 

2 Heckewelder,  History  of  the  Indian  Nations  of  Pennsylvania , 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


145 


with  the  Cherokees,  who  are  now  reckoned  among 
the  most  intelligent  and  progressive  of  Indian 
peoples.1  The  Cherokees  were  formerly  classed 
in  the  Muskoki  group,  along  with  the  t _ , 

° \ ° by  Cherokees ; 

Creeks  and  Choctaws,  but  a closer  study 
of  their  language  seems  to  show  that  they  were  a 
somewhat  remote  offshoot  of  the  Huron-Iroquois 
stock.  For  a long  time  they  occupied  the  coun- 
try between  the  Ohio  river  and  the  Great  Lakes, 
and  probably  built  the  mounds  that  are  still  to  be 
seen  there.  Somewhere  about  the  thirteenth  or 
fourteenth  century  they  were  gradually  pushed 
southward  into  the  Muskoki  region  by  repeated 
attacks  from  the  Lenape  and  Hurons.  The  Chero- 
kees were  probably  also  the  builders  of  the  mounds 
of  eastern  Tennessee  and  western  North  Carolina. 
They  retained  their  mound-building  habits  some 
time  after  the  white  men  came  upon  the  scene. 
On  the  other  hand  the  mounds  and  box-shaped 
stone  graves  of  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  db  Sha 
and  northern  Georgia  were  probably  nees,  and 

i J other  tribes. 

the  work  ot  Shawnees,  and  the  stone 
graves  in  the  Delaware  valley  are  to  be  ascribed 
to  the  Lenape.  There  are  many  reasons  for  be- 
lieving that  the  mounds  of  northern  Mississippi 
were  constructed  by  Chickasaws,  and  the  burial 
tumuli  and  “ effigy  mounds  ” of  Wisconsin  by  Win- 

etc.,  Philadelphia,  1818;  cf.  Squier,  Historical  and  Mythological 
Traditions  of  the  Algpnquins , a paper  read  before  the  New  York 
Historical  Society  in  June,  1848 ; also  Brinton,  The  Lenape  and 
their  Legends , Philadelphia,  1885. 

1 For  a detailed  account  of  their  later  history,  see  C.  C.  Boyce, 
“The  Cherokee  Nation,”  Reports  of  Bureau  of  Ethnology , v. 
121-378. 


146 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


nebagos.  The  Minnitarees  and  Mandans  were 
also  very  likely  at  one  time  a mound-building  peo- 
ple. 

If  this  view,  which  is  steadily  gaining  ground, 
be  correct,  our  imaginary  race  of  “ Mound-Build- 
ers ” is  broken  up  and  vanishes,  and  henceforth 
we  may  content  ourselves  with  speaking  of  the 
authors  of  the  ancient  earthworks  as  “ Indians.” 
There  were  times  in  the  career  of  sundry  Indian 
tribes  when  circumstances  induced  them  to  erect 
mounds  as  sites  for  communal  houses  or  council 
houses,  medicine-lodges  or  burial-places ; somewhat 
as  there  was  a period  in  the  history  of  our  own  fore- 
fathers in  England  when  circumstances  led  them 
to  build  moated  castles,  with  drawbridge  and  port- 
cullis ; and  there  is  no  more  occasion  for  assum- 
ing a mysterious  race  of  “ Mound-Builders  ” in 
America  than  for  assuming  a mysterious  race  of 
“ Castle-Builders  ” in  England. 

Thus,  at  whatever  point  we  touch  the  subject  of 
ancient  America,  we  find  scientific  opinion  tending 
more  and  more  steadily  toward  the  conclusion  that 
its  people  and  their  culture  were  indigenous.  One 
of  the  most  important  lessons  impressed  upon  us 
Society  in  by  a long  study  of  comparative  mythol- 
“fethe  °gy  is  that  human  minds  in  different 
reaSYtages  parts  of  the  world,  but  under  the  influ- 
stage^reached  ence  of  similar  circumstances,  develop 
Mediterranean  similar  ideas  and  clothe  them  in  simi- 
or  sixty  cep  lar  forms  of  expression.  It  is  just  the 
tunes  earlier.  game  w^h  political  institutions,  with 

the  development  of  the  arts,  with  social  customs, 


ANCIENT  AMERICA. 


147 


with  culture  generally.  To  repeat  the  remark 
already  quoted  from  Sir  J ohn  Lubbock,  — and  it 
is  well  worth  repeating,  — “ Different  races  in 
similar  stages  of  development  often  present  more 
features  of  resemblance  to  one  another  than  the 
same  race  does  to  itself  in  different  stages  of  its 
history.”  When  the  zealous  Abbe  Brasseur  found 
things  in  the  history  of  Mexico  that  reminded  him 
of  ancient  Egypt,  he  hastened  to  the  conclusion 
that  Mexican  culture  was  somehow  “ derived  ” 
from  that  of  Egypt.  It  was  natural  enough  for 
him  to  do  so,  but  such  methods  of  explanation  are 
now  completely  antiquated.  Mexican  culture  was 
no  more  Egyptian  culture  than  a prickly-pear  is  a 
lotus.  It  was  an  outgrowth  of  peculiar  American 
conditions  acting  upon  the  aboriginal  American 
mind, jtnd  such  of  its  features  as  remind  us  of  an- 
cient Egypt  or  prehistoric  Greece  show  simply  that 
it  was  approaching,  though  it  had  not  reached, 
the  standard  attained  in  those  Old  World  coun- 
tries. From  this  point  of  view  the  resemblances 
become  invested  with  surpassing  interest.  An- 
cient America,  as  we  have  seen,  was  a much  more 
archaic  world  than  the  world  of  Europe  and  Asia, 
and  presented  in  the  time  of  Columbus  forms  of 
society  that  on  the  shores  of  the  Mediterranean 
had  been  outgrown  before  the  city  of  Rome  was 
built.  Hence  the  intense  and  peculiar  fascination 
of  American  archaeology,  and  its  profound  impor- 
tance to  the  student  of  general  history. 


CHAPTER  II. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 

There  is  something  solemn  and  impressive  in 
the  spectacle  of  human  life  thus  going  on  for  count- 
less ages  in  the  Eastern  and  Western  halves  of  our 
planet,  each  all  unknown  to  the  other  and  uninflu- 
enced by  it.  The  contact  between  the  two  worlds 
practically  begins  in  1492. 

By  this  statement  it  is  not  meant  to  deny  that 
occasional  visitors  may  have  come  and  did  come 
before  that  famous  date  from  the  Old  World  to 
the  New.  On  the  contrary  I am  inclined  to  sus- 
pect that  there  may  have  been  more  such  occa- 
sional visits  than  we  have  been  wont  to  suppose. 
For  the  most  part,  however,  the  subject  is  shrouded 
in  the  mists  of  obscure  narrative  and  fantastic  con- 
jecture. When  it  is  argued  that  in  the  fifth  cen- 
tury of  the  Christian  era  certain  Buddhist  mission- 
Th  oh*  ary  Priests  came  from  China  by  way  of 
Kamtchatka  and  the  Aleutian  islands, 
and  kept  on  till  they  got  to  a country  which  they 
called  Fusang,  and  which  was  really  Mexico,  one 
cannot  reply  that  such  a thing  was  necessarily  and 
absolutely  impossible ; but  when  other  critics  as- 
sure us  that,  after  all,  Fusang  was  really  Japan, 
perhaps  one  feels  a slight  sense  of  relief.1  So  of 

1 This  notion  of  the  Chinese  visiting  Mexico  was  set  forth  by 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


149 


the  dim  whispers  of  voyages  to  America  under- 
taken by  the  Irish,  in  the  days  when  the  cloisters  of 
sweet  Innisfallen  were  a centre  of  piety  and  culture 
for  northwestern  Europe,1  we  may  say 

_ i . „ _ . * ’ J J The  Irish. 

that  this  sort  ot  thing  has  not  much  to 
do  with  history,  or  history  with  it.  Irish  ancho- 
rites certainly  went  to  Iceland  in  the  seventh  cen- 
tury,2 and  in  the  course  of  this  book  we  shall  have 
frequent  occasion  to  observe  that  first  and  last 
there  has  been  on  all  seas  a good  deal  of  blowing 
and  drifting  done.  It  is  credibly  reported  that 
Japanese  junks  have  been  driven  ashore  on  the 

the  celebrated  Deguignes  in  1761,  in  the  Memoir es  de  V Academic 
des  Inscriptions , tom.  xxviii.  pp.  506-525.  Its  absurdity  was 
shown  by  Klaproth,  “Recherches  sur  le  pays  de  Fou  Sang,” 
Nouvelles  annales  des  voyages , Paris,  1831,  2e  s^rie,  tom.  xxi.  pp. 
53-68  ; see  also  Klaproth’s  introduction  to  Annales  des  empereurs 
du  Japon,  Paris,  1834,  pp.  iv.-ix. ; Humboldt,  Examen  critique  de 
Vhistoire  de  la  giographie  du  nouveau  continent , Paris,  1837,  tom. 
ii.  pp.  62-84.  The  fancy  was  revived  by  C.  G.  Leland  (“  Hans 
Breitmann”),  in  his  Fusang , London,  1875,  and  was  again  demol- 
ished by  the  missionary,  S.  W.  Williams,  in  the  Journal  of  the 
American  Oriental  Society , vol.  xi.,  New  Haven,  1881. 

1 On  the  noble  work  of  the  Irish  church  and  its  missionaries  in 
the  sixth  and  seventh  centuries,  see  Montalembert,  Les  moines 
d*  Occident,  tom.  ii.  pp.  465-661 ; tom.  iii.  pp.  79-332 ; Burton’s 
History  of  Scotland , vol.  i.  pp.  234-277 ; and  the  instructive  map 
in  Miss  Sophie  Bryant’s  Celtic  Ireland,  London,  1889,  p.  60.  The 
notice  of  the  subject  in  Milman’s  Latin  Christianity , vol.  ii. 
pp.  236-247,  is  entirely  inadequate. 

2 The  passion  for  solitude  led  some  of  the  disciples  of  St.  Co- 
lumba  to  make  their  way  from  Iona  to  the  Hebrides,  and  thence 
to  the  Orkneys,  Shetlands,  Faeroes,  and  Iceland,  where  a colony 
of  them  remained  until  the  arrival  of  the  Northmen  in  874.  See 
Dicuil,  Liber  de  mensura  Orbis  Terrce  (a.  d.  825),  Paris,  1807 ; 
Innes,  Scotland  in  the  Middle  Ages,  p.  101 ; Lanigan,  Ecclesiasti- 
cal History  of  Ireland,  chap.  iii. ; Maurer,  Bextrdge  zur  Rechts- 
geschichte  des  Germanischen  Nordens,  i.  35.  For  the  legend  of  St. 
Brandan,  see  Gaffarel,  Les  voyages  de  St.  Brandan,  Paris,  1881. 


150  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

coasts  of  Oregon  and  California ; 1 and  there  is  a 
cousin,  of  story  that  in  1488  a certain  Jean  Cousin, 
Dieppe.  0f  Dieppe,  while  sailing  down  the  west 
coast  of  Africa,  was  caught  in  a storm  and  blown 
across  to  Brazil.2  This  was  certainly  quite  possible, 
for  it  was  not  so  very  unlike  what  happened  in 
1500  to  Pedro  Alvarez  de  Cabral,  as  we  shall  here- 
after see ; 3 nevertheless,  the  evidence  adduced  in 
support  of  the  story  will  hardly  bear  a critical  ex- 
amination.4 

It  is  not  my  purpose  to  weary  the  reader  with  a 
general  discussion  of  these  and  some  other  legends 
or  rumours  of  pre-Columbian  visitors  to  America. 
We  may  admit,  at  once,  that  “there  is  no  good 
reason  why  any  one  of  them  may  not  have  done  ” 
what  is  claimed,  but  at  the  same  time 
are  of  little  the  proof  that  any  one  of  them  did  do 
it  is  very  far  from  satisfactory.6  More- 
over the  questions  raised  are  often  of  small  impor- 
tance, and  belong  not  so  much  to  the  serious  work- 
shop of  history  as  to  its  limbo  prepared  for  learned 
trifles,  whither  we  will  hereby  relegate  them.6 

1 C.  W.  Brooks,  of  San  Francisco,  cited  in  Higginson,  Larger 
History  of  the  United  States,  p.  24. 

2 Desmarquets,  Memoir es  chronologiques  pour  servir  a Vhistoire 
de  Dieppe,  Paris,  1785,  tom.  i.  pp.  91-98 ; Estancelin,  Recherches 
sur  les  voyages  et  dtcouvertes  des  navigateurs  normands,  etc.,  Paris, 
1832,  pp.  332-361. 

3 See  below,  vol.  ii.  p.  96. 

4 As  Harrisse  says,  concerning  the  alleged  voyages  of  Cousin  and 
others,  “Quant  aux  voyages  du  Dieppois  Jean  Cousin  en  1488, 
de  Joao  Ramalho  en  1490,  et  de  Joao  Yaz  Cortereal  en  1464  ou 
1474,  le  lecteur  nous  pardonnera  de  les  passer  sous  silence.”  Chris - 
tophe  Colomh,  Paris,  1884,  tom.  i.  p.  307. 

5 Winsor,  Narr.  and  Crit.  Hist.,  i.  59. 

6 Sufficiently  full  references  may  be  found  in  Watson’s  Bibli- 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  151 

But  when  we  come  to  the  voyages  of  the  North- 
men in  the  tenth  and  eleventh  centu-  but  thecae 
ries,  it  is  quite  a different  affair.  Not  men^fntSeiy 
only  is  this  a subject  of  much  historic  different' 
interest,  but  in  dealing  with  it  we  stand  for  a great 
part  of  the  time  upon  firm  historic  ground.  The 
narratives  which  tell  us  of  Vinland  and  of  Leif 
Ericsson  are  closely  intertwined  with  the  authentic 
history  of  Norway  and  Iceland.  In  the  ninth  cen- 
tury of  our  era  there  was  a process  of  political 
consolidation  going  on  in  Norway,  somewhat  as  in 
England  under  Egbert  and  his  successors.  After 
a war  of  twelve  years,  King  Harold  Fairhair  over- 
threw the  combined  forces  of  the  Jarls,  or  small 
independent  princes,  in  the  decisive  naval  battle 
of  Hafursfiord  in  the  year  8T2.  This 

_ . . TT  ^ f,  , , The  Viking 

resulted  , m making  Harold  the  feudal  exodus  from 
landlord  of  Norway.  Allodial  tenures 
were  abolished,  and  the  Jarls  were  required  to  be- 
come his  vassals.  This  consolidation  of  the  king- 
dom was  probably  beneficial  in  its  main  conse- 
quences, but  to  many  a proud  spirit  and  crafty 
brain  it  made  life  in  Norway  unendurable.  These 
bold  J arls  and  their  Viking 1 followers,  to  whom, 

ography  of  the  Pre-Columbian  Discoveries  of  America , appended 
to  Anderson’s  America  not  discovered  by  Columbus,  3d  ed.,  Chi- 
cago, 1883,  pp.  121-164  ; and  see  the  learned  chapters  by  W.  H. 
Tillinghast  on  “The  Geographical  Knowledge  of  the  Ancients 
considered  in  relation  to  the  Discovery  of  America,”  and  by  Jus- 
tin Winsor  on  “ Pre-Columbian  Explorations,”  in  Narr.  and  Crit. 
Hist.,  vol.  i. 

1 The  proper  division  of  this  Old  Norse  word  is  not  into  vi -Icing, 
but  into  vik-ing.  The  first  syllable  means  a “bay”  or  “fiord,” 
the  second  is  a patronymic  termination,  so  that  “vikings”  are 
“sons  of  the  fiord,”  — an  eminently  appropriate  and  descriptive 


name. 


152 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


as  to  the  ancient  Greeks,  the  sea  was  not  a barrier, 
but  a highway,1  had  no  mind  to  stay  at  home  and 
submit  to  unwonted  thraldom.  So  they  manned 
their  dragon-prowed  keels,  invoked  the  blessing  of 
Wodan,  god  of  storms,  upon  their  enterprise,  and 
sailed  away.  Some  went  to  reinforce  their  kins- 
men who  were  making  it  so  hot  for  Alfred  in  Eng- 
land2 and  for  Charles  the  Bald  in  Gaul;  some 
had  already  visited  Ireland  and  were  establishing 
themselves  at  Dublin  and  Limerick;  others  now 
followed  and  found  homes  for  themselves  in  the 
Hebrides  and  all  over  Scotland  north  of  glorious 
Loch  Linnhe  and  the  Murray  frith;  some  made 
their  way  through  the  blue  Mediterranean  to 
“ Micklegard,”  the  Great  City  of  the  Byzantine 
Emperor,  and  in  his  service  wielded  their  stout  axes 
against  Magyar  and  Saracen ; 3 some  found  their 
amphibious  natures  better  satisfied  upon  the  islands 
of  the  Atlantic  ridge,  — the  Orkneys,  Shetlands, 

1 Curtius  ( Griechische  Etymologie,  p.  237)  connects  ttSvtos  with 
itoltos  ; compare  the  Homeric  expressions  vypa  /ceAeufla,  lx^v6eura 
iceAevda , etc. 

2 The  descendants  of  these  Northmen  formed  a very  large  pro- 
portion of  the  population  of  the  East  Anglian  counties,  and  con- 
sequently of  the  men  who  founded  New  England.  The  East  An- 
glian counties  have  been  conspicuous  for  resistance  to  tyranny 
and  for  freedom  of  thought.  See  my  Beginnings  of  New  Eng- 
land, p.  62. 

3 They  were  the  Varangian  guard  at  Constantinople,  described 
by  Sir  Walter  Scott  in  Count  Robert  of  Paris.  About  this  same 
time  their  kinsmen,  the  Russ,  moving  eastward  from  Sweden, 
were  subjecting  Slavic  tribes  as  far  as  Novgorod  and  Kief,  and 
laying  the  foundations  of  the  power  that  has  since,  through  many 
and  strange  vicissitudes,  developed  into  Russia.  See  Thomsen, 
The  Relations  between  Ancient  Russia  and  Scandinavia , Oxford, 

1877. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  153 

and  Faeroes,  and  especially  noble  Iceland.  There 
an  aristocratic  republic  soon  grew  up, 
owning  slight  and  indefinite  allegiance  Iceland,  D. 
to  the  kings  of  Norway.1  The  settle- 
ment of  Iceland  was  such  a wholesale  colonization 
of  communities  of  picked  men  as  had  not  been 
seen  since  ancient  Greek  times,  and  was  not  to  be 
seen  again  until  Winthrop  sailed  into  Massachu- 
setts Bay.  It  was  not  long  before  the  population 
of  Iceland  exceeded  50,000  souls.  Their  sheep 
and  cattle  flourished,  hay  crops  were  heavy,  a lively 
trade  — with  fish,  oil,  butter,  skins,  and  wool,  in 
exchange  for  meal  and  malt  — was  kept  up  with 
Norway,  Denmark,  and  the  British  islands,  polit- 
ical freedom  was  unimpaired,2  justice  was  (for 

1 Fealty  to  Norway  was  not  formally  declared  until  1262. 

2 The  settlement  of  Iceland  is  celebrated  by  Robert  Lowe  in 
verses  which  show  that,  whatever  his  opinion  may  have  been  in 
later  years  as  to  the  use  of  a classical  education,  his  own  early 
studies  must  always  have  been  a source  of  comfort  to  him : — 

* 

XaZpe  Kac  ev  ve<f>4\ai<ri  naC  ev  vuf>a8e<r(rt  {S ape  Cats 
Kai  nvpl  Kal  aeianoZs  vrjae  <raXevop.4vy]' 

’EvOaSe  yap  f3aeri\.rjos  vnepfitov  vf3piv  aAv£a? 

Arjfios  'YnepfiopeaiV,  koct/iou  4tt'  etrxan^, 

Avrapicri  Plotov  OeCmv  r epe6C<rfiara  M ovauv 
Kal  deap.QVi  ayvijs  evpev  eAcvdepta?. 

These  verses  are  thus  rendered  by  Sir  Edmund  Head  ( Viga 

Glums  Saga,  p.  v.) : — 

“ Hail,  Isle ! with  mist  and  snowstorms  girt  around, 

Where  fire  and  earthquake  rend  the  shattered  ground,  — 

Here  once  o’er  furthest  ocean’s  icy  path 
The  Northmen  fled  a tyrant  monarch’s  wrath  : 

Here,  cheered  by  song  and  story,  dwelt  they  free, 

And  held  unscathed  their  laws  and  liberty.” 

Laing  ( HeimsJcringla , vol.  i.  p.  57)  couples  Iceland  and  New  Eng- 
land as  the  two  modern  colonies  most  distinctly  “ founded  on 
principle  and  peopled  at  first  from  higher  motives  than  want  or 
gain.” 


154 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


the  Middle  Ages)  fairly  well  administered,  naval 
superiority  kept  all  foes  at  a distance  ; and  under 
such  conditions  the  growth  of  the  new  community 
in  wealth 1 and  culture  was  surprisingly  rapid.  In 
the  twelfth  century,  before  literature  had  begun  to 
blossom  in  the  modern  speech  of  France  or  Spain 
or  Italy,  there  was  a flourishing  literature  in  prose 
and  verse  in  Iceland.  Especial  attention  was  paid 
to  history,  and  the  “ Landnama-bok,”  or  statistical 
and  genealogical  account  of  the  early  settlers,  was 
the  most  complete  and  careful  work  of  the  kind 
which  had  ever  been  undertaken  by  any  people 
down  to  quite  recent  times.  Few  persons  in  our 
day  adequately  realize  the  extent  of  the  early 
Icelandic  literature  or  its  richness.  The  poems, 
legends,  and  histories  earlier  than  the  date  when 
Dante  walked  and  mused  in  the  streets  of  Flor- 
ence survive  for  us  now  in  some  hundreds  of  works, 
for  the  most  part  of  rare  and  absorbing  interest. 
The  “ Heimskringla,”  or  chronicle  of  Snorro  Sturle- 
son,  written  about  1215,  is  one  of  the  greatest  his- 
tory books  in  the  world.2 

1 Just  what  was  then  considered  wealth,  for  an  individual,  may 
best  he  understood  by  a concrete  instance.  The  historian  Snorro 
Sturleson,  born  in  1178,  was  called  a rich  man.  “ In  one  year,  in 
which  fodder  was  scarce,  he  lost  120  head  of  oxen  without  being1 
seriously  affected  by  it.”  The  fortune  which  he  got  with  his  first 
wife  Herdisa,  in  1199,  was  equivalent  nominally  to  $4,000,  or, 
according  to  the  standard  of  to-day,  about  $80,000.  Laing, 
Heimskringla , vol.  i.  pp.  191,  193. 

2 Laing’s  excellent  English  translation  of  it  was  published  in 
London  in  1844.  The  preliminary  dissertation,  in  five  chapters, 
is  of  great  value.  A new  edition,  revised  by  Prof.  Rasmus  An- 
derson, was  published  in  London  in  1889.  Another  charming 
hook  is  Sir  George  Dasent’s  Story  of  Burnt  Njal,  Edinburgh, 


PEE  COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


155 


Now  from  various  Icelandic  chronicles  1 we  learn 
that  in  876,  only  two  years  after  the  island  com- 

1801,  2 vols.,  translated  from  the  Njals  Saga.  Both  the  saga 
itself  and  the  translator’s  learned  introduction  give  an  admirable 
description  of  life  in  Iceland  at  the  end  of  the  tenth  century,  the 
time  when  the  voyages  to  America  were  made.  It  is  a very  in- 
structive chapter  in  history. 

The  Icelanders  of  the  present  day  retain  the  Old  Norse  lan- 
guage, while  on  the  Continent  it  has  been  modified  into  Swedish 
and  Norwegian-Danish.  They  are  a well-educated  people,  and, 
in  proportion  to  their  numbers,  publish  many  books. 

1 A full  collection  of  these  chronicles  is  given  in  Rafn’s  Antiqui- 
tates  Americanos,  Copenhagen,  1837,  in  the  original  Icelandic, 
with  Danish  and  Latin  translations.  This  hook  is  of  great  value 
for  its  full  and  careful  reproduction  of  original  texts  ; although 
the  rash  speculations  and  the  want  of  critical  discernment  shown 
in  the  editor’s  efforts  to  determine  the  precise  situation  of  Vin- 
land  have  done  much  to  discredit  the  whole  subject  in  the  eyes 
of  many  scholars.  That  is,  however,  very  apt  to  be  the  case 
with  first  attempts,  like  Rafn’s,  and  the  obvious  defects  of  his 
work  should  not  he  allowed  to  blind  us  to  its  merits.  In  the  foot- 
notes to  the  present  chapter  I shall  cite  it  simply  as  “ Rafn ; ” as 
the  exact  phraseology  is  often  important,  I shall  usually  cite  the 
original  Icelandic,  g,nd  (for  the  benefit  of  readers  unfamiliar  with 
that  language)  shall  also  give  the  Latin  version,  which  has  been 
well  made,  and  quite  happily  reflects  the  fresh  and  pithy  vigour 
of  the  original.  An  English  translation  of  all  the  essential  parts 
may  be  found  in  De  Costa,  Pre-Columbian  Discovery  of  America 
by  the  Northmen , 2d  ed.,  Albany,  1890;  see  also  Slafter,  Voyages 
of  the  Northmen  to  America , Boston,  1877  (Prince  Society).  An 
Icelandic  version,  interpolated  in  Peringskiold’s  edition  of  the 
Heimskringla,  1697,  is  translated  in  Laing,  vol.  iii.  pp.  344-361. 

The  first  modern  writer  to  call  attention  to  the  Icelandic  voy- 
ages to  Greenland  and  Vinland  was  Am  grim  Jdnsson,  in  his  Cry- 
mogcea , Hamburg,  1610,  and  more  explicitly  in  his  Specimen 
Islandice  historicum , Amsterdam,  1643.  The  voyages  are  also 
mentioned  by  Campanius,  in  his  Kort  besbrifning  om  provincien 
Nya  Swerige  uti  America , Stockholm,  1702.  The  first,  however, 
to  bring  the  subject  prominently  before  European  readers  was 
that  judicious  scholar  Thormodus  Torfseus,  in  his  two  books  His- 
toria  Virdandice  antiques , and  Historia  Gronlandice  antiques , Co- 


156  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


monwealtli  was  founded,  one  of  the  settlers  named 
Gmmbiorn  was  driven  by  foul  weather 

Discovery  of  0 . ,,  , » « 

Greenland,  to  some  point  on  the  coast  of  Green- 
land, where  he  and  his  crew  contrived 
to  pass  the  winter,  their  ship  being  locked  in  ice ; 

penhagen,  1705  and  1706.  Later  writers  have  until  very  recently 
added  but  little  that  is  important  to  the  work  of  Torfaeus.  In 
the  voluminous  literature  of  the  subject  the  discussions  chiefly 
worthy  of  mention  are  Forster’s  Geschichte  der  Entdeckungen  und 
Schiffahrten  im  Norden,  Frankfort,  1784,  pp.  44-88 ; and  Hum- 
boldt, Examen  critique , etc. , Paris,  1837,  tom.  i.  pp.  84-104 ; see, 
also,  Major,  Select  Letters  of  Columbus , London,  1847  (Hakluyt 
Soc.)  pp.  xii.-xxi.  The  fifth  chapter  of  Samuel  Laing’s  prelimi- 
nary dissertation  to  the  Heimskringla,  which  is  devoted  to  this 
subject,  is  full  of  good  sense ; for  the  most  part  the  shrewd  Ork- 
neyman  gets  at  the  core  of  the  thing,  though  now  and  then  a 
little  closer  knowledge  of  America  would  have  been  useful  to 
him.  The  latest  critical  discussion  of  the  sources,  marking  a 
very  decided  advance  since  Rafn’j  time,  is  the  paper  by  Gustav 
Storm,  professor  of  history  in  the  University  of  Christiania, 
“ Studier  over  Vinlandsreiserne,”  in  Aarbfiger  for  Nordisk  Old- 
kyndighed  og  Historie , Copenhagen,  1887,  pp.  293-372. 

Since  this  chapter  was  written  I have  seen  an  English  transla- 
tion of  the  valuable  paper  just  mentioned,  “ Studies  on  the  Vine- 
land  Voyages,”  in  Memoir es  de  la  soctiU  royale  des  antiquaires  du 
Nord,  Copenhagen  1888,  pp.  307-370.  I have  therefore  in  most 
cases  altered  my  footnote  references  below,  making  the  page- 
numbers  refer  to  the  English  version  (in  which,  by  the  way, 
some  parts  of  the  Norwegian  original  are,  for  no  very  obvious  rea- 
son, omitted).  By  an  odd  coincidence  there  comes  to  me  at  the 
same  time  a book  fresh  from  the  press,  whose  rare  beauty  of 
mechanical  workmanship  is  fully  equalled  by  its  intrinsic  merit, 
The  Finding  of  Wineland  the  Good  — the  History  of  the  Icelandic 
Discovery  of  America , edited  and  translated  from  the  earliest 
records  by  Arthur  Middleton  Reeves,  London,  1890.  This 
beautiful  quarto  contains  phototype  plates  of  the  original  Ice- 
landic vellums  in  the  Hauks-bdk,  the  MS.  AM.  557,  and  the 
Flateyar-bdk , together  with  the  texts  carefully  edited,  an  admi- 
rable English  translation,  and  several  chapters  of  critical  discus- 
sion decidedly  better  than  anything  that  has  gone  before  it.  On 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


157 


when  the  spring  set  them  free,  they  returned  to 
Iceland.  In  the  year  983  Eric  the  Red,  a settler 
upon  Oxney  (Ox-island)  near  the  mouth  of  Brei- 
dafiord,  was  outlawed  for  killing  a man  in  a 
brawl.  Eric  then  determined  to  search  for  the 
western  land  which  Gunnbjom  had  discovered. 
He  set  out  with  a few  followers,  and  in  the  next 
three  years  these  bold  sailors  explored  the  coasts 
of  Greenland  pretty  thoroughly  for  a considerable 
distance  on  each  side  of  Cape  Farewell.  At 
length  they  found  a suitable  place  for  a home,  at 
the  head  of  Igaliko  fiord,  not  far  from  the  site  of 
the  modern  Julianeshaab.1  It  was  fit  work  for 
Vikings  to  penetrate  so  deep  a fiord  and  find  out 
such  a spot,  hidden  as  it  is  by  miles  upon  miles  of 
craggy  and  ice-covered  headlands.  They  proved 
their  sagacity  by  pitching  upon  one  of  the  pleasant- 
est spots  on  the  gaunt  Greenland  coast ; and  there 
upon  a smooth  grassy  plain  may  still  be  seen  the 
ruins  of  seventeen  houses  built  of  rough  blocks  of 
sandstone,  their  chinks  caulked  up  with 
clay  and  gravel.  In  contrast  with  most  inOnaSaul 
of  its  bleak  surroundings  the  place 
might  well  be  called  Greenland,  and  so  Eric  named 
it,  for,  said  he,  it  is  well  to  have  a pleasant  name 
if  we  would  induce  people  to  come  hither.  The 
name  thus  given  by  Eric  to  this  chosen  spot  has 

reading  it  carefully  through,  it  seems  to  me  the  best  book  we 
have  on  the  subject  in  English,  or  perhaps  in  any  language. 

Since  the  above  was  written,  the  news  has  come  of  the  sudden 
and  dreadful  death  of  Mr.  Reeves,  in  the  railroad  disaster  at  Ha- 
gerstown, Indiana,  February  25, 1891.  Mr.  Reeves  was  an  Amer- 
ican scholar  of  most  brilliant  promise,  only  in  his  thirty-fifth  year. 

1 Rink,  Danish  Greenland , p.  6. 


158 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


been  extended  in  modern  usage  to  tbe  whole  of 
the  vast  continental  region  north  of  Davis  strait, 
for  the  greater  part  of  which  it  is  a flagrant  mis- 
nomer.1 In  986  Eric  ventured  back  to  Iceland, 
and  was  so  successful  in  enlisting  settlers  for 
Greenland  that  on  his  return  voyage  he  started 
with  five  and  twenty  ships.  The  loss  from  foul 
weather  and  icebergs  was  cruel.  Eleven  vessels 
were  lost ; the  remaining  fourteen,  carrying  prob- 
ably from  four  to  five  hundred  souls,  arrived  safely 
at  the  head  of  Igaliko  fiord,  and  began  building 
their  houses  at  the  place  called  Brattahlid.  Their 
settlement  presently  extended  over  the  head  of 
Tunnudliorbik  fiord,  the  next  deep  inlet  to  the 
northwest ; they  called  it  Ericsfiord.  After  a 
while  it  extended  westward  as  far  as  Immartinek, 
and  eastward  as  far  as  the  site  of  Friedrichsthal ; 
and  another  distinct  settlement  of  less  extent  was 
also  made  about  four  hundred  miles  to  the  north- 
west, near  the  present  site  of  Godthaab.  The 
older  settlement,  which  began  at  Igaliko  fiord,  was 
known  as  the  East  Bygd  ; 2 the  younger  settlement, 
near  Godthaab,  was  called  the  West  Bygd. 

1 We  thus  see  the  treacherousness  of  one  of  the  arguments 
cited  by  the  illustrious  Arago  to  prove  that  the  Greenland  coast 
must  he  colder  now  than  in  the  tenth  century.  The  Icelanders, 
he  thinks,  called  it  “ a green  land  ” because  of  its  verdure,  and 
therefore  it  must  have  been  warmer  than  at  present.  But  the 
land  which  Eric  called  green  was  evidently  nothing  more  than 
the  region  about  Julianeshaab,  which  still  has  plenty  of  verdure  ; 
and  so  the  argument  falls  to  the  ground.  See  Arago,  Sur  Vetat 
thermometrique  du  globe  terrestre,  in  his  (Euvres , tom.  v.  p.  243. 
There  are  reasons,  however,  for  believing  that  Greenland  was 
warmer  in  the  tenth  century  than  at  present.  See  below,  p.  176. 

2 The  map  is  reduced  from  Rafn’s  Antiquitates  Americance,  tab. 
xv.  The  ruins  dotted  here  and  there  upon  it  have  been  known 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


159 


This  colonization  of  Greenland  by  the  North- 
men in  the  tenth  century  is  as  well  established  as 
any  event  that  occurred  in  the  Middle  Ages.  For 
four  hundred  years  the  fortunes  of  the  Greenland 
colony  formed  a part,  albeit  a very  humble  part, 
of  European  history.  Geographically  speaking, 
Greenland  is  reckoned  as  a part  of  America,  of 

ever  since  the  last  rediscovery  of  Greenland  in  1721,  but  until 
after  1831  they  were  generally  supposed  to  he  the  ruins  of  the 
West  Bygd.  After  the  fifteenth  century,  when  the  old  colony 
had  perished,  and  its  existence  had  become  a mere  literary 
tradition,  there  grew  up  a notion  that  the  names  East  Bygd 
and  West  Bygd  indicated  that  the  two  settlements  must  have 
been  respectively  eastward  and  westward  of  Cape  Farewell; 
and  after  1721  much  time  was  wasted  in  looking  for  vestiges  of 
human  habitations  on  the  barren  and  ice-bound  eastern  coast. 
At  length,  in  1828-31,  the  exploring  expedition  sent  out  by  the 
Danish  government,  under  the  very  able  and  intelligent  Captain 
Graah,  demonstrated  that  both  settlements  were  west  of  Cape 
Farewell;  and  that  the  ruins  here  indicated  upon  the  map  are  the 
ruins  of  the  East  Bygd.  It  now  became  apparent  that  a certain 
description  of  Greenland  by  Ivar  Bardsen  — written  in  Greenland 
in  the  fourteenth  century,  and  generally  accessible  to  European 
scholars  since  the  end  of  the  sixteenth,  hut  not  held  in  much 
esteem  before  Captain  Graah’s  expedition  — was  quite  accurate 
and  extremely  valuable.  From  Bardsen’s  description,  about 
which  we  shall  have  more  to  say  hereafter,  we  can  point  out  upon 
the  map  the  ancient  sites  with  much  confidence.  Of  those  men- 
tioned in  the  present  work,  the  bishop's  church,  or  “ cathedral  ” 
(a  view  of  which  is  given  below,  p.  222),  was  at  Kakortok.  The 
village  of  Gardar,  which  gave  its  name  to  the  bishopric,  was  at 
Kaksiarsuk,  at  the  northeastern  extremity  of  Igaliko  fiord.  Op- 
posite Kaksiarsuk,  on  the  western  fork  of  the  fiord,  the  reader  will 
observe  a ruined  church ; that  marks  the  site  of  Brattahlid.  The 
fiord  of  Igaliko  was  called  by  the  Northmen  Einarsfiord ; and 
that  of  Tunnudliorbik  was  their  Ericsfiord.  The  monastery  of  St. 
Olaus,  visited  by  Nicolb  Zeno  (see  below,  p.  240),  is  supposed  by 
Mr.  Major  to  have  been  situated  near  the  Iisblink  at  the  bottom 
of  Tessermiut  fiord,  between  the  east  shore  of  the  fiord  and  the 
small  lake  indicated  on  the  map. 


160 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  East  Bygd,  or  Eastern  Settlement 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


161 


of  the  Northmen  in  Greenland. 


162 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


the  western  hemisphere,  and  not  of  the  eastern. 
The  Northmen  who  settled  in  Greenland  had,  there- 
fore, in  this  sense  found  their  way  to  America. 
Nevertheless  one  rightly  feels  that  in  the  history 
of  geographical  discovery  an  arrival  of  Europeans 
in  Greenland  is  equivalent  merely  to  reaching  the 
vestibule  or  ante-chamber  of  the  western  hemi- 
sphere. It  is  an  affair  begun  and  ended  outside 
of  the  great  world  of  the  red  men. 

But  the  story  does  not  end  here.  Into  the  world 
of  the  red  men  the  voyagers  from  Iceland  did  as- 
suredly come,  as  indeed,  after  once  getting  a foot- 
hold upon  Greenland,  they  could  hardly  fail  to  do. 
Let  us  pursue  the  remainder  of  the  story  as  we 
find  it  in  our  Icelandic  sources  of  information,  and 
afterwards  it  will  be  proper  to  inquire  into  the 
credibility  of  these  sources. 

One  of  the  men  who  accompanied  Eric  to 
Greenland  was  named  Herjulf,  whose  son  Bjarni, 
after  roving  the  seas  for  some  years,  came  home  to 
Iceland  in  986  to  drink  the  Yuletide  ale  with  his 
father.  Finding  him  gone,  he  weighed  anchor 
and  started  after  him  to  Greenland,  but  encoun- 
tered foggy  weather,  and  sailed  on  for  many  days 
by  guess-work  without  seeing  sun  or 
Bj£SeHer-  stars.  When  at  length  he  sighted  land 
juifson,  986.  wag  a without  mountains,  show- 

ing only  small  heights  covered  with  dense  woods. 
It  was  evidently  not  the  land  of  fiords  and  glaciers 
for  which  Bjarni  was  looking.  So  without  stopping 
to  make  explorations  he  turned  his  prow  to  the 
north  and  kept  on.  The  sky  was  now  fair,  and 
after  scudding  nine  or  ten  days  with  a brisk  breeze 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


163 


astern,  Bjami  saw  the  icy  crags  of  Greenland 
looming  up  before  him,  and  after  some  further 
searching  found  his  way  to  his  father’s  new  home.1 
On  the  route  he  more  than  once  sighted  land  on 
the  larboard* 

This  adventure  of  Bj arm’s  seems  not  to  have 
excited  general  curiosity  or  to  have  awakened 
speculation.  Indeed,  in  the  dense  geographical 
ignorance  of  those  times  there  is  no  reason  why  it 
should  have  done  so.  About  994  Bjami  was  in 
Norway,  and  one  or  two  people  expressed  some 
surprise  that  he  did  not  take  more  pains  to  learn 
something  about  the  country  he  had  seen ; but 
nothing  came  of  such  talk  till  it  reached  the  ears 
of  Leif,  the  famous  son  of  Eric  the  Bed.  This 
wise  and  stately  man  2 spent  a year  or  two  in  Nor- 
way about  998.  Roman  missionary  priests  were 
then  preaching  up  and  down  the  land,  conversion  of 
and  had  converted  the  king,  Olaf  Tryg-  S' cSrt£n-n 
gvesson,  great-grandson  of  Harold  Fair-  lty’ 
hair.  Leif  became  a Christian  and  was  baptised, 
and  when  he  returned  to  Greenland  he  took  priests 
with  him  who  converted  many  people,  though  old 
Eric,  it  is  said,  preferred  to  go  in  the  way  of  his 
fathers,  and  deemed  boisterous  Valhalla,  with  its 
cups  of  wassail,  a place  of  better  cheer  than  the 
New  Jerusalem,  with  its  streets  of  gold. 


1 In  Herjulfsfiord,  at  the  entrance  to  which  the  modern 
Friedrichsthal  is  situated.  Across  the  fiord  from  Friedrichsthal 
a ruined  church  stands  upon  the  cape  formerly  known  as  Her- 
julfsness.  See  map. 

2 “ Leifryar  mikillmadhr  ok  sterkr,  manna  skoruligastr  at  sj4, 
vitr  madhr  ok  g<5dhr  h<5fsmadhr  um  alia  hluti,”  i.  e.  “Leif 
was  a large  man  and  strong,  of  noble  aspect,  prudent  and  mod- 
erate in  all  things.”  Rafn,  p.  33. 


164 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


Leif’s  zeal  for  the  conversion  of  his  friends  in 
Greenland  did  not  so  far  occupy  his  mind  as  to 
prevent  him  from  undertaking  a voyage  of  dis- 
covery. His  curiosity  had  been  stimulated  by 
what  he  had  heard  about  Bjarni’s  experiences,  and 
he  made  up  his  mind  to  go  and  see  what  the  coasts 
to  the  south  of  Greenland  were  like.  He  sailed 
Leif  Erics-  from  Brattahlid  — probably  in  the  sum- 
1000!  voyage’  mer  or  early  autumn  of  the  year  1000  1 
— with  a crew  of  five  and  thirty  men.  Some 
distance  to  the  southward  they  came  upon  a barren 
country  covered  with  big  flat  stones,  so  that  they 
called  it  Helluland,  or  “ slate-land.” 

Helluland.  . 

ihere  is  little  room  tor  doubt  that  this 
was  the  coast  opposite  Greenland,  either  west  or 
east  of  the  strait  of  Bello  Isle ; in  other  words, 
it  was  either  Labrador  or  the  northern  coast  of 
Newfoundland.  Thence,  keeping  generally  to  the 
southward,  our  explorers  came  after  some  days  to 
a thickly  wooded  coast,  where  they  landed  and 
inspected  the  country.  What  chiefly  impressed 
them  was  the  extent  of  the  forest,  so  that  they 
called  the  place  Markland,  or  “ wood-land.”  Some 
critics  have  supposed  that  this  spot  was 
somewhere  upon  the  eastern  or  southern 
coast  of  Newfoundland,  but  the  more  general 

1 The  year  seems  to  have  been  that  in  which  Christianity  was 
definitely  established  by  law  in  Iceland,  viz.,  A.  d.  1000.  The 
chronicle  Thattr  Eireks  Raudha  is  careful  about  verifying  its  dates 
by  checking  one  against  another.  See  Rafn,  p.  15.  The  most 
masterly  work  on  the  conversion  of  the  Scandinavian  people  is 
Maurer’s  Die  Bekehrung  des  Norwegischen  Stammes  zum  Chris- 
tenthume,  Munich,  1855 ; for  an  account  of  the  missionary  work 
in  Iceland  and  Greenland,  see  vol.  i.  pp.  191-242,  443-452. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


165 


opinion  places  it  somewhere  upon  the  coast  of 
Cape  Breton  island  or  Nova  Scotia.  From  this 
Markland  our  voyagers  stood  out  to  sea,  and  run- 
ning briskly  before  a stiff  northeaster  it  was  more 
than  two  days  before  they  came  in  sight  of  land. 
Then,  after  following  the  coast  for  a while,  they 
went  ashore  at  a place  where  a river,  issuing  from 
a lake,  fell  into  the  sea.  They  brought  their  ship 
up  into  the  lake  and  cast  anchor.  The  water 
abounded  in  excellent  fish,  and  the  country  seemed 
so  pleasant  that  Leif  decided  to  pass  the  winter 
there,  and  accordingly  his  men  put  up  some  com- 
fortable wooden  huts  or  booths.  One  day  one  of 
the  party,  a “ south  country  ” man,  whose  name 
was  Tyrker,1  came  in  from  a ramble  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood making  grimaces  and  talking  to  himself 
in  his  .own  language  (probably  Ger-  ^ ^ 
man),  which  his  comrades  did  not  under- 
stand. On  being  interrogated  as  to  the  cause  of  his 

1 The  name  means  “ Turk,”  and  has  served  as  a touchstone  for 
the  dullness  of  commentators.  To  the  Northmen  a “ Southman  ” 
would  naturally  be  a German,  and  why  should  a German  be  called 
a Turk  ? or  how  should  these  Northmen  happen  to  have  had  a 
Turk  in  their  company  ? Mr.  Laing  suggests  that  he  may  have 
been  a Magyar.  Yes  ; or  he  may  have  visited  the  Eastern  Empire 
and  taken  part  in  a fight  against  Turks,  and  so  have  got  a soubri- 
quet, just  as  Thorhall  Gamlason,  after  returning  from  Vinland 
to  Iceland,  was  ever  afterward  known  as  “ the  Vinlander.”  That 
did  not  mean  that  he  was  an  American  redskin.  See  below,  p.  203. 
From  Tyrker’s  grimaces  one  commentator  sagely  infers  that  he 
had  been  eating  grapes  and  got  drunk  ; and  another  (even  Mr. 
Laing ! ) thinks  it  necessary  to  remind  us  that  all  the  grape-juice 
in  Vinland  would  not  fuddle  a man  unless  it  had  been  fermented, 
— and  then  goes  on  to  ascribe  the  absurdity  to  our  innocent  chron- 
icle, instead  of  the  stupid  annotator.  See  Heimskringla,  vol.  i.  p. 
168. 


166 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


excitement,  he  replied  that  he  had  discovered  vines 
loaded  with  grapes,  and  was  much  pleased  at  the 
sight  inasmuch  as  he  had  been  brought  up  in  a 
vine  country.  Wild  grapes,  indeed,  abounded  in 
this  autumn  season,  and  Leif  accordingly  called  the 
country  Vinland.  The  winter  seems  to  have  passed 
off  very  comfortably.  Even  the  weather  seemed 
mild  to  these  visitors  from  high  latitudes,  and  they 
did  not  fail  to  comment  on  the  unusual  length  of 
the  winter  day.  Their  language  on  this  point  has 
been  so  construed  as  to  make  the  length  of  the 
shortest  winter  day  exactly  nine  hours,  which 
would  place  their  Vinland  in  about  the  latitude  of 
Boston.  But  their  expressions  do  not  admit  of 
any  such  precise  construction ; and  when  we  re- 
member that  they  had  no  accurate  instruments  for 
measuring  time,  and  that  a difference  of  about 
fourteen  minutes  between  sunrise  and  sunset  on 
the  shortest  winter  day  would  make  all  the  differ- 
ence between  Boston  and  Halifax,  we  see  how  idle 
it  is  to  look  for  the  requisite  precision  in  narratives’ 
of  this  sort,  and  to  treat  them  as  one  would  treat 
the  reports  of  a modern  scientific  exploring  expe- 
dition. 

In  the  spring  of  1001  Leif  returned  to  Green- 
land with  a cargo  of  timber.1  The  voyage  made 
much  talk.  Leif’s  brother  Thorvald  caught  the 

1 On  the  homeward  voyage  he  rescued  some  shipwrecked  sail- 
ors near  the  coast  of  Greenland,  and  was  thenceforward  called 
Leif  the  Lucky  (et  postea  cognominatus  est  Leivus  Fortunatus). 
The  pleasant  reports  from  the  newly  found  country  gave  it  the 
name  of  “ Vinland  the  Good.”  In  the  course  of  the  winter  fol- 
lowing Leif’s  return  his  father  died. 


PRE-COL UMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


167 


,c" 


inspiration,1  and,  borrowing  Leif’s  ship,  sailed  in 
1002,  and  succeeded  in  finding  Vinland  and  Leif’s 
huts,  where  his  v men  spent  two  winters.  In  the 
intervening  summer  they  went  on  an  yoyagegof 
exploring  expedition  along  the  coast,  Kl^in,and 
fell  in  with  some  savages  in  canoes,  and  1002 *~05- 
got  into  a fight  in  which  Thorvald  was  killed  by 
an  arrow.  In  the  spring  of  1004  the  ship  re- 
turned to  Brattahlid.  Next  year  the  third  brother, 
Thorstein  Ericsson,  set  out  in  the  same  ship,  with 
his  wife  Gudrid  and  a crew  of  thirty-five  men ; 
but  they  were  sore  bestead  with  foul  weather,  got 
nowhere,  and  accomplished  nothing.  Thorstein 
died  on  the  voyage,  and  his  widow  returned  to 
Greenland. 

In  the  course  of  the  next  summer,  1006,  there 
came  to  Brattahlid  from  Iceland  a notable  person- 
age, a man  of  craft  and  resource,  wealthy  withal 
and  well  born,  with  the  blood  of  many  kinglets 
or  jarls  flowing  in  his  veins.  This  man,  Thor- 
finn  Karlsefni,  straightway  fell  in  love  with  the 
young  and  beautiful  widow  Gudrid,  and  in  the 
course  of  the  winter  there  was  a merry  wedding  at 
Brattahlid.  Persuaded  by  his  adventurous  bride, 
whose  spirit  had  been  roused  by  the  re- 

A J Thorfinn 

ports  from  Yinland  and  by  her  former  Karisefni,  and 

x J his  unsuccess- 

unsuccessful  attempt  to  find  it,  Thor-  attempt  to 

found  a colony 

finn  now  undertook  to  visit  that  country  j^5oand’ 
in  force  sufficient  for  founding  a col- 
ony there.  Accordingly  in  the  spring  of  1007  he 

1 “Jam  crebri  de  Leivi  in  Vinlandiam  profectione  sermones 

serebantur,  Thorvaldus  vero,  frater  ejus,  nimis  pauca  terrae  loca 

explorata  fuisse  judicavit.”  Rafn,  p.  39. 


168  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


started  with  three  or  four  ships,1  carrying  one  hun- 
dred and  sixty  men,  several  women,  and  quite  a 
cargo  of  cattle.  In  the  course  of  that  year  his  son 
Snorro  was  born  in  Vinland,2  and  our  chronicle 
tells  us  that  this  child  was  three  years  old  before 
the  disappointed  company  turned  their  backs  upon 
that  land  of  promise  and  were  fain  to  make  their 
way  homeward  to  the  fiords  of  Greenland.  It 
was  the  hostility  of  the  natives  that  compelled 
Thorfinn  to  abandon  his  enterprise.  At  first  they 
traded  with  him,  bartering  valuable  furs  for  little 
strips  of  scarlet  cloth  which  they  sought  most 
eagerly  ; and  they  were  as  terribly  frightened  by 
his  cattle  as  the  Aztecs  were  in  later  days  by  the 
Spanish  horses.3  The  chance  bellowing  of  a bull 
sent  them  squalling  to  the  woods,  and  they  did 
not  show  themselves  again  for  three  weeks.  After 
a while  quarrels  arose,  the  natives  attacked  in 

1 Three  is  the  number  usually  given,  but  at  least  four  of  their 
ships  would  be  needed  for  so  large  a company ; and  besides 
Thorfinn  himself,  three  other  captains  are  mentioned,  — Snorro 
Thorbrandsson,  Bjarni  Grimolfsson,  and  Thorhall  Gamlason. 
The  narrative  gives  a picturesque  account  of  this  Thorhall,  who 
was  a pagan  and  fond  of  deriding  his  comrades  for  their  belief  in 
the  new-fangled  Christian  notions.  He  seems  to  have  left  his 
comrades  and  returned  to  Europe  before  they  had  abandoned 
their  enterprise.  A further  reference  to  him  will  be  made  below, 
p.  203. 

2 To  this  boy  Snorro  many  eminent  men  have  traced  their  an- 
cestry,— bishops,  university  professors,  governors  of  Iceland, 
and  ministers  of  state  in  Norway  and  Denmark.  The  learned 
antiquarian  Finn  Magnusson  and  the  celebrated  sculptor  Thor- 
waldsen  regarded  themselves  as  thus  descended  from  Thorfinn 
Karlsefni. 

3 Compare  the  alarm  of  the  Wampanoag  Indians  in  1603  at 
the  sight  of  Martin  Pring’s  mastiff.  Winsor,  Narr.  and  Crit. 
Hist.,  iii.  174. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


169 


great  numbers,  many  Northmen  were  killed,  and 
in  1010  the  survivors  returned  to  Greenland  with 
a cargo  of  timber  and  peltries.  On  the  way 
thither  the  ships  seem  to  have  separated,  and  one 
of  them,  commanded  by  Bjami  Grimolfsson,  found 
itself  bored  by  worms  (the  teredo ) and  sank,  with 
its  commander  and  half  the  crew.1 

Among  Karlsefni’s  companions  on  this  mem- 
orable expedition  was  one  Thorvard,  with  his  wife 
Freydis,  a natural  daughter  of  Eric  the  Red. 
About  the  time  of  their  return  to  Greenland  in 
the  summer  of  1010,  a ship  arrived  from  Norway, 
commanded  by  two  brothers,  Helgi  and  Finnbogi. 

1 The  fate  of  Bjami  was  pathetic  and  noble.  It  was  decided 
that  as  many  as  possible  should  save  themselves  in  the  stern  boat- 
4'  Then  Bjami  ordered  that  the  men  should  go  in  the  boat  by  lot, 
and  not  according  to  rank.  As  it  would  not  hold  all,  they  ac- 
cepted the  saying,  and  when  the  lots  were  drawn,  the  men  went 
out  of  the  ship  into  the  boat.  The  lot  was  that  Bjami  should 
go  down  from  the  ship  to  the  boat  with  one  half  of  the  men. 
Then  those  to  whom  the  lot  fell  went  down  from  the  ship  to  the 
boat.  When  they  had  come  into  the  boat,  a young  Icelander, 
who  was  the  companion  of  Bjami,  said : ‘ Now  thus  do  you  in- 
tend to  leave  me,  Bjami  ? ’ Bjami  replied,  * That  now  seems 
necessary.’  He  replied  with  these  words  : ‘ Thou  art  not  true  to 
the  promise  made  when  I left  my  father’s  house  in  Iceland.’ 
Bjarni  replied  : ‘ In  this  thing  I do  not  see  any  other  way  ’ ; con- 
tinuing, ‘ What  course  can  you  suggest  ? * He  said  : ‘ I see  this, 
that  we  change  places  and  thou  come  up  here  and  I go  down 
there.’  Bjarni  replied : ‘ Let  it  be  so,  since  I see  that  you 
are  so  anxious  to  live,  and  are  frightened  by  the  prospect  of 
death.’  Then  they  changed  places,  and  he  descended  into  the 
boat  with  the  men,  and  Bjarni  went  up  into  the  ship.  It  is  re- 
lated that  Bjarni  and  the  sailors  with  him  in  the  ship  perished  in 
the  worm  sea.  Those  who  went  in  the  boat  went  on  their  course 
until  they  came  to  land,  where  they  told  all  these  things.”  De 
Costa’s  version  from  Saga  Thorfinns  Karlsefnis , Rafn,  pp.  184- 
186. 


170  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


During  the  winter  a new  expedition  was  planned, 
Freydis,  and  an<^  *n  the  summer  of  1011  two  ships 
?nViniLde,edS  S0t  sail  f°r  Vinland,  one  with  Freydis, 
1011-12.  Thorvard,  and  a crew  of  30  men,  the 
other  with  Helgi  and  Finnbogi,  and  a crew  of 
35  men.  There  were  also  a number  of  women. 
The  purpose  was  not  to  found  a colony  but  to  cut 
timber.  The  brothers  arrived  first  at  Leif’s  huts 
and  had  begun  carrying  in  their  provisions  and 
tools,  when  Freydis,  arriving  soon  afterward,  or- 
dered them  off  the  premises.  They  had  no  right, 
she  said,  to  occupy  her  brother’s  houses.  So  they 
went  out  and  built  other  huts  for  their  party  a 
little  farther  from  the  shore.  Before  their  business 
was  accomplished  “ winter  set  in,  and  the  brothers 
proposed  to  have  some  games  for  amusement  to 
pass  the  time.  So  it  was  done  for  a time,  till  dis- 
cord came  among  them,  and  the  games  were  given 
up,  and  none  went  from  one  house  to  the  other ; 
and  things  went  on  so  during  a great  part  of  the 
winter.”  At  length  came  the  catastrophe.  Frey- 
dis one  night  complained  to  her  husband  that  the 
brothers  had  given  her  evil  words  and  struck  her, 
and  insisted  that  he  should  forthwith  avenge  the 
affront.  Presently  Thorvard,  unable  to  bear  her 
taunts,  was  aroused  to  a deed  of  blood.  With  his 
followers  he  made  a night  attack  upon  the  huts  of 
Helgi  and  Finnbogi,  seized  and  bound  all  the 
occupants,  and  killed  the  men  one  after  another  in 
cold  blood.  Five  women  were  left  whom  Thorvard 
would  have  spared;  as  none  of  his  men  would 
raise  a hand  against  them,  Freydis  herself  took  an 
axe  and  brained  them  one  and  all.  In  the  spring 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


171 


of  1012  the  party  sailed  for  Brattahlid  in  the  ship 
of  the  murdered  brothers,  which  was  the  larger 
and  better  of  the  two.  Freydis  pretended  that 
they  had  exchanged  ships  and  left  the  other  party 
in  Yinland.  With  gifts  to  her  men,  and  dire 
threats  for  any  who  should  dare  tell  what  had  been 
done,  she  hoped  to  keep  them  silent.  Words  were 
let  drop,  however,  which  came  to  Leif’s  ears,  and 
led  him  to  arrest  three  of  the  men  and  put  them 
to  the  torture  until  they  told  the  whole  story. 
44 4 1 have  not  the  heart,’  said  Leif,  4 to  treat  my 
wicked  sister  as  she  deserves  ; but  this  I will  fore- 
tell them  [Freydis  and  Thorvard]  that  their  pos- 
terity will  never  thrive.’  So  it  went  that  nobody 
thought  anything  of  them  save  evil  from  that  time.” 
With  this  grewsome  tale  ends  all  account  of 
Norse  attempts  at  exploring  or  colonizing  Yinland, 
though  references  to  Yinland  by  no  means  end 
here.1  Taking  the  narrative  as  a whole,  it  seems 
to  me  a sober,  straightforward,  and  eminently  prob- 
able story.  We  may  not  be  able  to  say 
with  confidence  exactly  where  such  ry  is  eminently 
places  as  Markland  and  Yinland  were,  probable* 
but  it  is  clear  that  the  coasts  visited  on  these 
southerly  and  southwesterly  voyages  from  Brat- 
tahlid must  have  been  parts  of  the  coast  of  North 
America,  unless  the  whole  story  is  to  be  dismissed 
as  a figment  of  somebody’s  imagination.  But  for 
a figment  of  the  imagination,  and  of  European 

1 The  stories  of  Gudleif  Gudlaugsson  and  Ari  Marsson,  with 
the  fanciful  speculations  about  ‘ ‘ Hvitramannaland  ” and  “ Irland 
it  Mikla,”  do  not  seem  worthy  of  notice  in  this  connection.  They 
may  be  found  in  De  Costa,  op.  cit.  pp.  159-177 ; and  see  Reeves, 
The  Finding  of  Wineland  the  Good , chap.  v. 


172 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


imagination  withal,  it  has  far  too  many  points  of 
verisimilitude,  as  I shall  presently  show. 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  an  extremely  probable 
story  from  the  time  that  Eric  once  gets  settled  in 
Brattahlid.  The  founding  of  the  Greenland  col- 
ony is  the  only  strange  or  improbable  part  of  the 
narrative,  but  that  is  corroborated  in  so  many  other 
ways  that  we  know  it  to  be  true ; as  already 
observed,  no  fact  in  mediaeval  history  is  better 
established.  When  I speak  of  the  settlement  of 
Greenland  as  strange,  I do  not  mean  that  there  is 
anything  strange  in  the  Northmen’s  accomplishing 
the  voyage  thither  from  Iceland.  That  island 
is  nearer  to  Greenland  than  to  Norway,  and  we 
know,  moreover,  that  Norse  sailors  achieved  more 
difficult  things  than  penetrating  the  fiords  of 
southern  Greenland.  Upon  the  island  of  Kingi- 
torsook  in  Baffin’s  Bay  (72°  55'  N.,  56°  5'  W.) 

near  Upernavik,  in  a region  supposed  to 

Voyage  .into  r ,, 

Baffin’s  Bay,  have  been  un visited  by  man  before  the 

1135.  * 

modern  age  of  Arctic  exploration,  there 
were  found  in  1824  some  small  artificial  mounds 
with  an  inscription  upon  stone  : — “ Erling  Sigh- 
vatson  and  Bjarni  Thordharson  and  Eindrid  Odd- 
son  raised  these  marks  and  cleared  ground  on  Sat- 
urday before  Ascension  Week,  1135.”*  That  is 
to  say,  they  took  symbolic  possession  of  the  land.1 

In  order  to  appreciate  how  such  daring  voyages 
were  practicable,  we  must  bear  in  mind  that  the 
Viking  “ ships  ” were  probably  stronger  and  more 
seaworthy,  and  certainly  much  swifter,  than  the 
Spanish  vessels  of  the  time  of  Columbus.  One 

1 Laing-,  Heimskringla,  i.  152. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  173 

was  unearthed  a few  years  ago  at  Sandefiord  in 
Norway,  and  may  be  seen  at  the  museum  A Viking  Bhip 
in  Christiania.  Its  pagan  owner  had 
been  buried  in  it,  and  his  bones  were  Norway> 
found  amidships,  along  with  the  bones  of  a dog 
and  a peacock,  a few  iron  fish-hooks  and  other 
articles.  Bones  of  horses  and  dogs,  probably 
sacrificed  at  the  funeral  according  to  the  ancient 
Norse  custom,  lay  scattered  about.  This  craft  has 
been  so  well  described  by  Colonel  Higginson,1  that 
I may  as  well  quote  the  passage  in  full : — 

She  “was  seventy-seven  feet  eleven  inches  at 
the  greatest  length,  and  sixteen  feet  eleven  inches 
at  the  greatest  width,  and  from  the  top  of  the 
keel  to  the  gunwale  amidships  she  was  five  feet 
nine  inches  deep.  She  had  twenty  ribs,  and  would 
draw  less  than  four  feet  of  water.  She  was  clinker- 
built  ; that  is,  had  plates  slightly  overlapped,  like 
the  shingles  on  the  side  of  a house.  The  planks 
and  timbers  of  , the  frame  were  fastened  together 
with  withes  made  of  roots,  but  the  oaken  boards  of 
the  side  were  united  by  iron  rivets  firmly  clinched. 
The  bow  and  stern  were  similar  in  shape,  and  must 
have  risen  high  out  of  water,  but  were  so  broken 
that  it  was  impossible  to  tell  how  they  originally 
ended.  The  keel  was  deep  and  made  of  Description 
thick  oak  beams,  and  there  was  no  trace  01  the  Bhip' 
of  any  metallic  sheathing  ; but  an  iron  anchor  was 
found  almost  rusted  to  pieces.  There  was  no  deck 
and  the  seats  for  rowers  had  been  taken  out.  The 
oars  were  twenty  feet  long,  and  the  oar-holes,  six- 
teen on  each  side,  had  slits  sloping  towards  the 
1 See  his  Larger  History  of  the  United  States,  pp.  32-34. 


174 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


stern  to  allow  the  blades  of  the  oars  to  be  put 
through  from  inside.  The  most  peculiar  thing 
about  the  ship  was  the  rudder,  which  was  on  the 
starboard  or  right  side,  this  side  being  originally- 
called  4 steerboard  ’ from  this  circumstance.  The 
rudder  was  like  a large  oar,  with  long  blade  and 
short  handle,  and  was  attached,  not  to  the  side  of 
the  boat,  but  to  the  end  of  a conical  piece  of  wood 
which  projected  almost  a foot  from  the  side  of  the 
vessel,  and  almost  two  feet  from  the  stern.  This 
piece  of  wood  was  bored  down  its  length,  and  no 
doubt  a rope  passing  through  it  secured  the  rudder 
to  the  ship’s  side.  It  was  steered  by  a tiller  at- 
tached to  the  handle,  and  perhaps  also  by  a rope 
fastened  to  the  blade.  As  a whole,  this  disinterred 
vessel  proved  to  be  anything  but  the  rude  and 
primitive  craft  which  might  have  been  expected ; 
it  was  neatly  built  and  well  preserved,  constructed 
on  what  a sailor  would  call  beautiful  lines,  and 
eminently  fitted  for  sea  service.  Many  such  vessels 
may  be  found  depicted  on  the  celebrated  Bayeux 
tapestry  ; and  the  peculiar  position  of  the  rudder 
explains  the  treaty  mentioned  in  the  Heimskringla, 
giving  to  Norway  all  lands  lying  west  of  Scotland 
between  which  and  the  mainland  a vessel  could 
pass  with  her  rudder  shipped.  . . . This  was  not 
one  of  the  very  largest  ships,  for  some  of  them 
had  thirty  oars  on  each  side,  and  vessels  carrying 
from  twenty  to  twenty-five  were  not  uncommon. 
The  largest  of  these  were  called  Dragons,  and 
other  sizes  were  known  as  Serpents  or  Cranes. 
The  ship  itself  was  often  so  built  as  to  represent 
the  name  it  bore  : the  dragon,  for  instance,  was  a 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


175 


long  low  vessel,  with  the  gilded  head  of  a dragon 
at  the  bow,  and  the  gilded  tail  at  the  stern  ; the 
moving  oars  at  the  side  might  represent  the  legs 
of  the  imaginary  creature,  the  row  of  shining  red 
and  white  shields  that  were  hung  over  the  gun- 
wale looked  like  the  monster’s  scales,  and  the 
sails  striped  with  red  and  blue  might  suggest  his 
wings.  The  ship  preserved  at  Christiania  is  de- 
scribed as  having  had  but  a single  mast,  set  into 
a block  of  wood  so  large  that  it  is  said  no  such 
block  could  now  be  cut  in  Norway.  Probably  the 
sail  was  much  like  those  still  carried  by  large  open 
boats  in  that  country,  — a single  square  on  a mast 
forty  feet  long.1  These  masts  have  no  standing 
rigging,  and  are  taken  down  when  not  in  use ; and 
this  was  probably  the  practice  of  the  Vikings.” 

In  such  vessels,  well  stocked  with  food  and 
weapons,  the  Northmen  were  accustomed  to  spend 
many  weeks  together  on  the  sea,  now  and  then 
touching  land.  In  such  vessels  they  made  their 
way  to  Algiers  and  Constantinople,  to  the  White 
Sea,  to  Baffin’s  Bay.  It  is  not,  therefore,  their 
voyage  to  Greenland  that  seems  strange,  but  it 
is  their  success  in  founding  a colony  which  could 
last  for  more  than  four  centuries  in  that  in- 
hospitable climate.  The  question  is  sometimes 
asked  whether  the  climate  of  Greenland  The  climate  o{ 
may  not  have  undergone  some  change  Greenland- 
within  the  last  thousand  years.2  If  there  has  been 

1 Perhaps  it  may  have  been  a square-headed  lug,  like  those  of 
the  Deal  galley-punts;  see  Leslie’s  Old  Sea  Wings,  Ways,  and 
Words , in  the  Days  of  Oak  and  Hemp,  London,  1890,  p.  21. 

2 Some  people  must  have  queer  notions  about  the  lapse  of  past 


176 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


any  change,  it  must  have  been  very  slight ; such 
as,  perhaps,  a small  variation  in  the  flow  of  ocean 
currents  might  occasion.  I am  inclined  to  be- 
lieve that  there  may  have  been  such  a change, 
from  the  testimony  of  Ivar  Bardsen,  steward  of 
the  Gardar  bishopric  in  the  latter  half  of  the  four- 
teenth century,  or  about  halfway  between  the  time 
of  Eric  the  Red  and  our  own  time.  According  to 
Bardsen  there  had  long  been  a downward  drifting 
of  ice  from  the  north  and  a consequent  accumula- 
tion of  bergs  and  floes  upon  the  eastern  coast  of 
Greenland,  insomuch  that  the  customary  route 
formerly  followed  by  ships  coming  from  Iceland 
was  no  longer  safe,  and  a more  southerly  route 
had  been  generally  adopted.1  This  slow  southward 
extension  of  the  polar  ice-sheet  upon  the  east  of 
Greenland  seems  still  to  be  going  on  at  the  present 
day.2  It  is  therefore  not  at  all  improbable,  but  on 
the  contrary  quite  probable,  that  a thousand  years 
ago  the  mean  annual  temperature  of  the  tip  end  of 
Greenland,  at  Cape  Farewell,  was  a few  degrees 

time.  I have  more  than  once  had  this  question  put  to  me  in  such 
a way  as  to  show  that  what  the  querist  really  had  in  mind  was 
some  vague  impression  of  the  time  when  oaks  and  chestnuts,  vines 
and  magnolias,  grew  luxuriantly  over  a great  part  of  Greenland ! 
But  that  was  in  the  Miocene  period,  probably  not  less  than  a 
million  years  ago,  and  has  no  obvious  bearing  upon  the  deeds  of 
Eric  the  Red. 

1 Bardsen,  Descriptio  Grcenlandice , appended  to  Major’s  Voyages 
of  the  Venetian  Brothers , etc.,  pp.  40,  41 ; and  see  below,  p.  242. 

2 Zahrtmann,  Journal  of  Royal  Geographical  Society , London, 
1836,  vol.  v.  p.  102.  On  this  general  subject  see  J.  D.  Whitney, 
“ The  Climate  Changes  of  Later  Geological  Times,”  in  Memoirs 
of  the  Museum  of  Comparative  Zoology  at  Harvard  College , Cam- 
bridge, 1882,  vol.  vii.  According  to  Professor  Whitney  there  has 
also  been  a deterioration  in  the  climate  of  Iceland. 


PRE-COL XJMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


177 


higher  than  now.1  But  a slight  difference  of  this 
sort  might  have  an  important  bearing  upon  the 
fortunes  of  a colony  planted  there.  For  example, 
it  would  directly  affect  the  extent  of  the  hay  crop. 
Grass  grows  very  well  now  in  the  neighbourhood 
of  Julianeshaab.  In  summer  it  is  still  a “green 
land,”  with  good  pasturage  for  cattle,  but  there  is 
difficulty  in  getting  hay  enough  to  last  through  the 
nine  months  of  winter.  In  1855  “ there  were  in 
Greenland  80  to  40  head  of  horned  cattle,  about 
100  goats,  and  20  sheep  ; ” but  in  the  ancient  col- 
ony, with  a population  not  exceeding  6,000  per- 
sons, “ herds  of  cattle  were  kept  which  even  yielded 
produce  for  exportation  to  Europe.”  2 So  strong 
a contrast  seems  to  indicate  a much  more  plentiful 
grass  crop  than  to-day,  although  some  hay  might 
perhaps  have  been  imported  from  Iceland  in  ex- 
change for  Greenland  exports,  which  were  chiefly 
whale  oil,  eider-down,  and  skins  of  seals,  foxes, 
and  white  bears. 

When  once  the  Northmen  had  found  their  way 
to  Cape  Farewell,  it  would  have  been  marvellous 
if  such  active  sailors  could  long  have  avoided 
stumbling  upon  the  continent  of  North  America. 
Without  compass  or  astrolabe  these  daring  men 
were  accustomed  to  traverse  long  stretches  of  open 

1 One  must  not  too  hastily  infer  that  the  mean  temperature  of 
points  on  the  American  coast  south  of  Davis  strait  would  be 
affected  in  the  same  way.  The  relation  between  the  phenomena 
is  not  quite  so  simple.  For  example,  a warm  early  spring  on  the 
coast  of  Greenland  increases  the  discharge  of  icebergs  from  its 
fiords  to  wander  down  the  Atlantic  ocean  ; and  this  increase  of 
floating  ice  tends  to  chill  and  dampen  the  summers  at  least  as  far 
south  as  Long  Island,  if  not  farther. 

2 Rink’s  Danish  Greenland , pp.  27,  96,  97. 


178  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


sea,  trusting  to  the  stars;  and  it  needed  only 
a stiff  northeasterly  breeze,  with  per- 
Northmen  sistent  clouds  and  fog,  to  land  a west- 

once  in  Green-  ■,  , ■,  ,,  , » 

land,  the  dis-  ward  bound  “ dragon  anywhere  trom 
American  the  Cape  Race  to  Cape  Cod.  This  is  what 

continent  was  . ■.  , i i -r»*  • 

almost  inev-  appears  to  have  happened  to  15 j arm 
Herjulfsson  in  986,  and  something  quite 
like  it  happened  to  Henry  Hudson  in  16 09.1  Cu- 
riosity is  a motive  quite  sufficient  to  explain 
Leif’s  making  the  easy  summer  voyage  to  find  out 
what  sort  of  country  Bjarni  had  seen.  He  found 
it  thickly  wooded,  and  as  there  was  a dearth  of 
good  timber  both  in  Greenland  and  in  Iceland,  it 
would  naturally  occur  to  Leif’s  friends  that  voy- 
ages for  timber,  to  be  used  at  home  and  also  to  be 
exported  to  Iceland,  might  turn  out  to  be  profit- 
Voyagesfor  ^le.2  As  Laing  says,  “ to  go  in  quest 
timber.  0f  the  WOoded  countries  to  the  south- 
west, from  whence  driftwood  came  to  their  shores, 
was  a reasonable,  intelligible  motive  for  making  a 
voyage  in  search  of  the  lands  from  whence  it  came, 
and  where  this  valuable  material  could  be  got  for 
nothing.”  3 

If  now  we  look  at  the  details  of  the  story  we 
shall  find  many  ear-marks  of  truth  in  it.  We 
must  not  look  for  absolute  accuracy  in  a narra- 
tive which  — as  we  have  it  — is  not  the  work  of 

1 See  Read’s  Historical  Inquiry  concerning  Henry  Hudson , Al- 
bany, 1866,  p.  160. 

2 “ Nil  tekst  umrsedha  at  n£ju  um  V Inlandsf  erdh,  thviat  sii 
ferdh  thikir  bsedhi  g<5dh  til  fjdr  ok  virdhlngar, ’ ’ i.  e.  “Now  they 
began  to  talk  again  about  a voyage  to  Vinland,  for  the  voyage 
thither  was  both  gainful  and  honourable.”  Rafn,  p.  65. 

8 Heimskringla , i.  168. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


179 


Leif  or  Thorfinn  or  any  of  their  comrades,  but 
of  compilers  or  copyists,  honest  and  careful  as  it 
seems  to  me,  but  liable  to  misplace  details  and  to 
call  by  wrong  names  things  which  they  had  never 
seen.  Starting  with  these  modest  expectations  we 
shall  find  the  points  of  verisimilitude 
numerous.  To  begin  with  the  least  sig-  truth  in  the 
nificant,  somewhere  on  our  northeast-  narrative‘ 
ern  coast  the  voyagers  found  many  foxes.1  These 
animals,  to  be  sure,  are  found  in  a great  many  coun- 
tries, but  the  point  for  us  is  that  in  a southerly  and 
southwesterly  course  from  Cape  Farewell  these 
sailors  are  said  to  have  found  them.  If  our  narra- 
tors had  been  drawing  upon  their  imaginations  or 
dealing  with  semi-mythical  materials,  they  would  as 
likely  as  not  have  lugged  into  the  story  elephants 
from  Africa  or  hippogriffs  from  Dreamland  ; medi- 
aeval writers  were  blissfully  ignorant  of  all  canons 
of  probability  in  such  matters.2  But  our  narrators 
simply  mention  an  animal  which  has  for  ages 
abounded  on  our  northeastern  coasts.  One  such 
instance  is  enough  to  suggest  that  they  were  fol- 
lowing reports  or  documents  which  emanated  ulti- 
mately from  eye-witnesses  and  told  the  plain  truth. 
A dozen  such  instances,  if  not  neutralized  by 
counter-instances,  are  enough  to  make  this  view 
extremely  probable ; and  then  one  or  two  instances 

1 “Fjoldi  var  thar  melrakka,”  i.  e.  “ibi  vulpium  magnus 
numerus  erat,”  Rafn,  p.  138. 

2 It  is  extremely  difficult  for  an  impostor  to  concoct  a narra- 
tive without  making  blunders  that  can  easily  be  detected  by  a 
critical  scholar.  For  example,  the  Book  of  Mormon,  in  the  pas- 
sage cited  (see  above,  p.  3),  in  supremely  blissful  ignorance  intro- 
duces oxen,  sheep,  and  silk-worms,  as  well  as  the  knowledge  of 
smelting  iron,  into  pre-Columbian  America. 


180 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


which  could  not  have  originated  in  the  imagination 
of  a European  writer  will  suffice  to  prove  it. 

Let  us  observe,  then,  that  on  coming  to  Mark- 
land  they  “ slew  a bear ; ” 1 the  river  and  lake 
(or  bay)  in  Yinland  abounded  with  salmon  bigger 
than  Leif’s  people  had  ever  seen ; 2 on  the  coast 
they  caught  halibut ; 3 they  came  to  an  island 
where  there  were  so  many  eider  ducks  breeding 
that  they  could  hardly  avoid  treading  on  their 
eggs ; 4 and,  as  already  observed,  it  was  because 
of  the  abundance  of  wild  grapes  that  Leif  named 
the  southernmost  country  he  visited  Yinland. 

1 “Thar  i drdpu  their  einn  bjorn,”  i.  e.  “in  qua  ursum  inter- 
fecerunt,”  id.  p.  138. 

2 “ Hvorki  skorti  thar  lax  i dnni  n&  i vatninu,  ok  stserra  lax 
enn  their  hefdhi  fyrr  s&dh,”  i.  e.  “ ibi  neque  in  fluvio  neque  in 
lacu  deerat  salmonum  eopia,  et  quidem  majoris  corporis  quam 
antea  vidissent,  ” id.  p.  32. 

3 “Helgir  fiskar,”  i.  e.  “sacri  pisces,”  id.  p.  148.  The  Dan- 
ish phrase  is  “helleflyndre,”  i.  e.  “holy  flounder.”  The  Eng- 
lish halibut  is  hali  = holy  -f-  but  — flounder.  This  word  but  is 
classed  as  Middle  English,  but  may  still  be  heard  in  the  north  of 
England.  The  fish  may  have  been  so  called  “ from  being  eaten 
particularly  on  holy  days  ” ( Century  Diet.  s.  v.)  ; or  possibly  from  a 
pagan  superstition  that  water  abounding  in  flat  fishes  is  especially 
safe  for  mariners  (Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.  ix.  10)  ; or  possibly  from  some 
lost  folk-tale  about  St.  Peter  (Maurer,  Islandische  Volkssagen 
der  Gegenwart , Leipsic,  1860,  p.  195). 

4 “ Sva;  var  morg  sedhr  i eynni,  at  varla  mdtti  gdnga  fyri  egg- 
jum,”  i.  e.  “tantus  in  insula  anatum  mollissimarum  numerus 
erat,  ut  prse  ovis  transiri  fere  non  posset,”  id.  p.  141.  Eider  ducks 
breed  on  our  northeastern  coasts  as  far  south  as  Portland,  and  are 
sometimes  in  winter  seen  as  far  south  as  Delaware.  They  also 
abound  in  Greenland  and  Iceland,  and,  as  Wilson  observes,  “ their 
nests  are  crowded  so  close  together  that  a person  can  scarcely 
walk  without  treading  on  them.  . . . The  Icelanders  have  for 
ages  known  the  value  of  eider  down,  and  have  done  an  extensive 
business  in  it.”  See  Wilson’s  American  Ornithology , vol.  iii. 


p.  50. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


181 


From  the  profusion  of  grapes  — such  that  the 
ship’s  stem  boat  is  said  on  one  occasion  to  have 
been  filled  with  them 1 — we  get  a clue,  though  less 
decisive  than  could  be  wished,  to  the  location  of 
Vinland.  The  extreme  northern  limit 
of  the  vine  in  Canada  is  47°,  the  paral-  limit  of  the 
lei  which  cuts  across  the  tops  of  Prince 
Edward  and  Cape  Breton  islands  on  the  map.2 
Near  this  northern  limit,  however,  wild  grapes  are 
by  no  means  plenty  ; so  that  the  coast  upon  which 
Leif  wintered  must  apparently  have  been  south  of 
Cape  Breton.  Dr.  Storm,  who  holds  that  Vinland 
was  on  the  southern  coast  of  Nova  Scotia,  has 
collected  some  interesting  testimony  as  to  the 
growth  of  wild  grapes  in  that  region,  but  on  the 
whole  the  abundance  of  this  fruit  seems  rather  to 
point  to  £he  shores  of  Massachusetts  Bay.3 

We  may  now  observe  that,  while  it  is  idle  to 
attempt  to  determine  accurately  the  length  of  the 
winter  day,  as  given  in  our  chronicles,  Length  of  the 
nevertheless  since  that  length  attracted  wmt€r  day' 
the  attention  of  the  voyagers,  as  something  re- 


1 ( “Sva  er  sag-t  at  eptirMtr  theirra  var  fylldr  af  vln- 
( So  it-is-said  that  afterboat  their  was  filled  of  vine- 

berjum.”lEafn  p gg 
berries.  ) 

2 Storm,  “Studies  on  the  Vinland  Voyages,”  Mtmoires  de  la 
sociitt  royale  des  antiquaires  du  Nord , Copenhagen,  1888,  p.  351. 
The  limit  of  the  vine  at  this  latitude  is  some  distance  inland ; near 
the  shore  the  limit  is  a little  farther  south,  and  in  Newfoundland 
it  does  not  grow  at  all.  Id.  p.  308. 

8 The  attempt  of  Dr.  Kohl  ( Maine  Hist.  Soc. , New  Series,  vol. 
i.)  to  connect  the  voyage  of  Thorfinn  with  the  coast  of  Maine 
seems  to  he  successfully  refuted  by  De  Costa,  Northmen  in  Maine , 
etc.,  Albany,  1870. 


182 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


markable,  it  may  fairly  be  supposed  to  indicate  a 
latitude  lower  than  they  were  accustomed  to  reach 
in  their  trading  voyages  in  Europe.  Such  a lati- 
tude as  that  of  Dublin,  which  lies  opposite  Labra- 
dor, would  have  presented  no  novelty  to  them,  for 
voyages  of  Icelanders  to  their  kinsmen  in  Dub- 
lin, and  in  Rouen  as  well,  were  common  enough. 
Halifax  lies  about  opposite  Bordeaux,  and  Boston 
a little  south  of  opposite  Cape  Finisterre,  in  Spain, 
so  that  either  of  these  latitudes  would  satisfy  the 
conditions  of  the  case  ; either  would  show  a longer 
winter  day  than  Rouen,  which  was  about  the  south- 
ern limit  of  ordinary  trading  voyages  from  Ice- 
land. At  all  events,  the  length  of  day  indicates 
for  Yinland  a latitude  south  of  Cape  Breton. 

The  next  point  to  be  observed  is  the  mention  of 
“ self-sown  wheat-fields.’  1 This  is  not  only  an 
important  ear-mark  of  truth  in  the  narrative,  but 
it  helps  us  somewhat  further  in  determining  the 
position  of  Yinland.  The  “ self-sown  ” cereal, 
which  these  Icelanders  called  “ wheat,”  was  in  all 
probability  what  the  English  settlers  six  hundred 

years  afterward  called  “corn,”  in  each 

Indian  corn.  ^ 1 , 

case  applying  to  a new  and  nameless 
thing  the  most  serviceable  name  at  hand.  In 
England  “ corn  ” means  either  wheat,  barley,  rye, 
and  oats  collectively,  or  more  specifically  wheat ; 
in  Scotland  it  generally  means  oats ; in  America  it 
means  maize,  the  “ Indian  corn,”  the  cereal  pecul- 
iar to  the  western  hemisphere.  The  beautiful  wav- 
ing plant,  with  its  exquisitely  tasselled  ears,  which 


1 ( “Sj&lfs&na  hveitiakra 
( Self-sown  wheat-acres 


[ Rafn,  p.  147. 

i ) 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


183 


was  one  of  the  first  things  to  attract  Champlain’s 
attention,  could  not  have  escaped  the  notice  of 
such  keen  observers  as  we  are  beginning  to  find 
Leif  and  Thorfinn  to  have  been.  A cereal  like 
this,  requiring  so  little  cultivation  that  without 
much  latitude  of  speech  it  might  be  described  as 
growing  wild,  would  be  interesting  to  Europeans 
visiting  the  American  coast ; but  it  would  hardly 
occur  to  European  fancy  to  invent  such  a thing. 
The  mention  of  it  is  therefore  a very  significant 
ear-mark  of  the  truth  of  the  narrative.  As  re- 
gards the  position  of  Vinland,  the  presence  of 
maize  seems  to  indicate  a somewhat  lower  lati- 
tude than  Nova  Scotia.  Maize  requires  intensely 
hot  summers,  and  even  under  the  most  careful 
European  cultivation  does  not  flourish  north  of 
the  Alps.  In  the  sixteenth  century  its  northern- 
most limit  on  the  American  coast  seems  to  have 
been  at  the  mouth  of  the  Kennebec  (44°),  though 
farther  inland  it  was  found  by  Cartier  at  Hoche- 
laga,  on  the  site  of  Montreal  (45°  30').  A pre- 
sumption is  thus  raised  in  favour  of  the  opinion 
that  Yinland  was  not  farther  north  than  Massa- 
chusetts Bay.1 

This  presumption  is  supported  by  what  is  said 
about  the  climate  of  Yinland,  though  it  must  be 
borne  in  mind  that  general  statements  about  cli- 
mate are  apt  to  be  very  loose  and  misleading.  W e 

1 Dr.  Storm  makes  perhaps  too  much  of  this  presumption.  He 
treats  it  as  decisive  against  his  own  opinion  that  Vinland  was  the 
southern  coast  of  Nova  Scotia,  and  accordingly  he  tries  to  prove 
that  the  self-sown  corn  was  not  maize,  but  “wild  rice  ” ( Zizania 
aquatica).  Memoir es,  etc.,  p.  356.  But  his  argument  is  weakened 
by  excess  of  ingenuity. 


184 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


are  told  that  it  seemed  to  Leif’s  people  that  cattle 
would  he  able  to  pass  the  winter  out  of  doors  there, 
for  there  was  no  frost  and  the  grass  was 

Winter  - ~ ° 

weather  in  not  much  withered.1  On  the  other 

hand,  Thorfinn’s  people  found  the  win- 
ter severe,  and  suffered  from  cold  and  hunger.2 
Taken  in  connection  with  each  other,  these  two 
statements  would  apply  very  well  to-day  to  our 
variable  winters  on  the  coast  southward  from  Cape 
Ann.  The  winter  of  1889-90  in  Cambridge,  for 
example,  might  very  naturally  have  been  described 
by  visitors  from  higher  latitudes  as  a winter  with- 
out frost  and  with  grass  scarcely  withered.  In- 
deed, we  might  have  described  it  so  ourselves. 
On  Narragansett  and  Buzzard’s  bays  such  soft 
winter  weather  is  still  more  common ; north  of 
Cape  Ann  it  is  much  less  common.  The  severe 
winter  ( magno  Mems)  is  of  course  familiar  enough 
anywhere  along  the  northeastern  coast  of  America. 

On  the  whole,  we  may  say  with  some  confidence 
that  the  place  described  by  our  chroni- 

Probable  situ-  , TT.  , , , , - 

ation  of  vin-  clers  as  V inland  was  situated  somewhere 
between  Point  Judith  and  Cape  Bre- 
ton ; possibly  we  may  narrow  our  limits  and  say 

1 “ Thar  var  sva  godhr  landskostr  at  thvi  er  theim  s^ndist,  at 
thar  mundi  eingi  f&nadhr  f<5dhr  thurfa  d vetrum ; thar  kvomu 
eingi  frost  & vetrum,  ok  litt  r^nudhu  thargros,”  i.  e.  “ tanta  autem 
erat  terrae  bonitas,  ut  inde  intelligere  esset,  pecora  hieme  pabulo 
non  indigere  posse,  nullis  incidentibus  algoribus  hiemalibus,  et 
graminibus  parum  flaeeescentibus.”  Rafn,  p-  32. 

2 “ Thar  voru  their  um  vetrinn;  ok  gjordhist  vetr  mikill,  en 
ekki  fyri  unnit  ok  gjordhist  flit  til  matarins,  ok  tokust  af  vei- 
dhirnar,”  i.  e.  “ hichiemarunt ; cum  vero  magna  incideret  hiems, 
nullumque  provisum  esset  alimentum,  cibus  coepit  deficere  captu- 
raque  cessabat.  ’ ’ Id.  p.  174. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


185 


that  it  was  somewhere  between  Cape  Cod  and 
Cape  Ann.  But  the  latter  conclusion  is  much  less 
secure  than  the  former.  In  such  a case  as  this, 
the  more  we  narrow  our  limits  the  greater  our 
liability  to  error.1  While  by  such  narrowing, 
moreover,  the  question  may  acquire  more  interest 
as  a bone  of  contention  among  local  antiquarians, 
its  value  for  the  general  historian  is  not  increased. 

But  we  have  not  yet  done  with  the  points  of  veri- 
similitude in  our  story.  We  have  now  to  cite  two 
or  three  details  that  are  far  more  striking  than  any 
as  yet  mentioned,  — details  that  could  never  have 
been  conjured  up  by  the  fancy  of  any  mediaeval 
European.  We  must  bear  in  mind  that  “ sav- 
ages,” whether  true  savages  or  people  in  „ Savage8 « 
the  lower  status  of  barbarism,  were  prac- 
tically  unknown  to  Europeans  before  Eur°Pea“* 
the  fifteenth  century.  There  were  no  such  people 
in  Europe  or  in  any  part  of  Asia  or  Africa  visited 
by  Europeans  before  the  great  voyages  of  the 
Portuguese.  Mediaeval  Europeans  knew  nothing 
whatever  about  people  who  would  show  surprise  at 
the  sight  of  an  iron  tool 2 or  frantic  terror  at  the 

1 A favourite  method  of  determining  the  exact  spots  visited  by 
the  Northmen  has  been  to  compare  their  statements  regarding 
the  shape  and  trend  of  the  coasts,  their  bays,  headlands,  etc., 
with  various  well-known  points  on  the  New  England  coast.  It  is 
a tempting  method,  but  unfortunately  treacherous,  because  the 
same  general  description  will  often  apply  well  enough  to  several 
different  places.  It  is  like  summer  boarders  in  the  country  strug- 
gling to  tell  one  another  where  they  have  been  to  drive,  — past  a 
school-house,  down  a steep  hill,  through  some  woods,  and  by  a 
saw-mill,  etc. 

2 It  is  not  meant  that  stone  implements  did  not  continue  to  be 
used  in  some  parts  of  Europe  far  into  the  Middle  Ages.  But 


186  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


voice  of  a bull,  or  who  would  eagerly  trade  off 
valuable  property  for  worthless  trinkets.  Their 
imagination  might  be  up  to  inventing  hobgoblins 
and  people  with  heads  under  their  shoulders,1  but 
it  was  not  up  to  inventing  such  simple  touches  of 
nature  as  these.  Bearing  this  in  mind,  let  us 
observe  that  Thorfinn  found  the  natives  of  Yin- 
land  eager  to  give  valuable  furs  2 in  exchange  for 

this  was  not  because  iron  was  not  perfectly  well  known,  but  be- 
cause in  many  backward  regions  it  was  difficult  to  obtain  or  to 
work,  so  that  stone  continued  in  use.  As  my  friend,  Mr.  T.  S. 
Perry,  reminds  me,  Helbig  says  that  stone-pointed  spears  were 
used  by  some  of  the  English  at  the  battle  of  Hastings,  and  stone 
battle-axes  by  some  of  the  Scots  under  William  Wallace  at  the 
end  of  the  thirteenth  century.  Die  Italiker  in  der  Poebene,  Leip- 
sic,  1879,  p.  42.  Helbig’s  statement  as  to  Hastings  is  confirmed 
by  Freeman,  Norman  Conquest  of  England , vol.  iii.  p.  478. 

1 My  use  of  the  word  “ inventing  ” is,  in  this  connection,  a slip 
of  the  pen.  Of  course  the  tales  of  “ men  whose  heads  do  grow 
beneath  their  shoulders,”  the  Sciopedse,  etc.,  as  told  by  Sir  John 
Mandeville,  were  not  invented  by  the  mediaeval  imagination,  but 
copied  from  ancient  authors.  They  may  be  found  in  Pliny,  Hist. 
Nat.,  lib.  vii.,  and  were  mentioned  before  his  time  by  Ktesias,  as 
well  as  by  Hecataeus,  according  to  Stephanus  of  Byzantium.  Cf. 
Aristophanes,  Aves,  1558  ; Julius  Solinus,  Polyhistor,  ed.  Salma- 
sius,  cap.  240.  Just  as  these  sheets  are  going  to  press  there  comes 
to  me  Mr.  Perry’s  acute  and  learned  History  of  Greek  Literature , 
New  York,  1890,  in  which  this  subject  is  mentioned  in  connec- 
tion with  the  mendacious  and  medical  Ktesias : — These  stories 
have  probably  acquired  a literary  currency  “ by  exercise  of  the 
habit,  not  unknown  even  to  students  of  science,  of  indiscriminate 
copying  from  one’s  predecessors,  so  that  in  reading  Mandeville 
we  have  the  ghosts  of  the  lies  of  Ktesias,  almost  sanctified  by 
the  authority  of  Pliny,  who  quoted  them  and  thereby  made 
them  a part  of  mediaeval  folk-lore  — and  from  folk-lore,  proba- 
bly, they  took  their  remote  start  ” (p.  522). 

2 “ En  that  var  grdvara  ok  safvali  ok  allskonar  skinnavara” 
(Rafn,  p.  59),  — i.  e.  gray  fur  and  sable  and  all  sorts  of  skin- 
wares  ; in  another  account,  ‘ ‘ skinnavoru  ok  algrd.  skinn,”  which 
in  the  Danish  version  is  “ skindvarer  og  segte  graaskind”  (id. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


187 


little  strips  of  scarlet  cloth  to  bind  about  their 
heads.  When  the  Northmen  found  the  cloth  grow- 
ing scarce  they  cut  it  into  extremely  narrow  strips, 
but  the  desire  of  the  natives  was  so  great  that 
they  would  still  give  a whole  skin  for  the  smallest 
strip.  They  wanted  also  to  buy  weap-  ^ nativetl  ^ 
ons,  but  Thorfinn  forbade  his  men  to  v,nlan<L 
sell  them.  One  of  the  natives  picked  up  an 
iron  hatchet  and  cut  wood  with  it ; one  after  an- 
other tried  and  admired  it ; at  length  one  tried  it 
on  a stone  and  broke  its  edge,  and  then  they  scorn- 
fully threw  it  down.1  One  day  while  they  were 
trading,  Thorfinn’s  bull  ran  out  before  them  and 
bellowed,  whereupon  the  whole  company  was  in- 
stantly scattered  in  headlong  flight.  After  this, 
when  threatened  with  an  attack  by  the  natives, 
Thorfinn  drew  up  his  men  for  a fight  and  put  the 
bull  in  front,  very  much  as  Pyrrhus  used  elephants 
— at  first  with  success  — to  frighten  the  Romans 
and  their  horses.2 

p.  150),  — i.  e.  skinwares  and  genuine  gray  furs.  Cartier  in  Can- 
ada and  the  Puritans  in  Massachusetts  were  not  long  in  Ending 
that  the  natives  had  good  furs  to  sell. 

1 Rafn,  p.  156. 

2 Much  curious  information  respecting  the  use  of  elephants  in 
war  may  he  found  in  the  learned  work  of  the  Chevalier  Armandi, 
Histoire  militaire  des  iltphants , Paris,  1843.  As  regards  Thor- 
finn’s hull,  Mr.  Laing  makes  the  kind  of  blunder  that  our  Brit- 
ish cousins  are  sometimes  known  to  make  when  they  get  the 
Rocky  Mountains  within  sight  of  Bunker  Hill  monument.  “ A 
continental  people  in  that  part  of  America,”  says  Mr.  Laing, 
“ could  not  he  strangers  to  the  much  more  formidable  bison.” 
Heimskringla , p.  169.  Bisons  on  the  Atlantic  coast,  Mr.  Laing  ? ! 
And  then  his  comparison  quite  misses  the  point ; a bison,  if  the 
natives  had  been  familiar  with  him,  would  not  have  been  at  all 
formidable  as  compared  to  the  hull  which  they  had  never  before 


188 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


These  incidents  are  of  surpassing  interest,  for 
they  were  attendant  upon  the  first  meeting  (in  all 
probability)  that  ever  took  place  between  civilized 
Europeans  and  any  people  below  the  upper  status 
of  barbarism.1  Who  were  these  natives  encoun- 
tered by  Thorfinn?  The  Northmen  called  them 
“ Skraelings,”  a name  which  one  is  at  first  sight 
strongly  tempted  to  derive  from  the  Icelandic  verb 
sJcrceTcja , identical  with  the  English  screech.  A 
crowd  of  excited  Indians  might  most  appropri- 
ately be  termed  Screechers.2  This  derivation, 
however,  is  not  correct.  The  word  skrceling  sur- 
vives in  modern  Norwegian,  and  means  a feeble 
M . of  or  puny  or  insignificant  person.  Dr. 
^SkSngs  ” Storm’s  suggestion  is  in  all  probability 
correct,  that  the  name  “ Skraelings,”  as 
applied  to  the  natives  of  America,  had  no  ethno- 
logical significance,  but  simply  meant  “inferior 
people ; ” it  gave  concise  expression  to  the  white 
man’s  opinion  that  they  were  “a  bad  lot.”  In 
Icelandic  literature  the  name  is  usually  applied  to 
the  Eskimos,  and  hence  it  has  been  rashly  inferred 
that  Thorfinn  found  Eskimos  in  Yinland.  Such 
was  Rafn’s  opinion,  and  since  his  time  the  corn- 

seen.  A horse  is  much  less  formidable  than  a cougar,  hut  Aztec 
warriors  who  did  not  mind  a cougar  were  paralyzed  with  terror  at 
the  sight  of  men  on  horseback.  It  is  the  unknown  that  frightens 
in  such  cases.  Thorfinn’s  natives  were  probably  familiar  with 
such  large  animals  as  moose  and  deer,  hut  a deer  is  n’t  a bull. 

1 The  Phoenicians,  however  (who  in  this  connection  may  he 
classed  with  Europeans),  must  have  met  with  some  such  people  in 
the  course  of  their  voyages  upon  the  coasts  of  Africa.  I shall 
treat  of  this  more  fully  below,  p.  327. 

2 As  for  Indians,  says  Cieza  de  Leon,  they  are  all  noisy  (alhara- 
quientos).  Segunda  Parte  de  la  Crdnica  del  Peru , cap.  xxiii. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


189 


mentators  have  gone  off  upon  a wrong  trail  and 
much  ingenuity  has  been  wasted.1  It  would  be 
well  to  remember,  however,  that  the  Europeans  of 
the  eleventh  century  were  not  ethnologists ; in 
meeting  these  inferior  peoples  for  the  first  time  they 
were  more  likely  to  be  impressed  with  the  broad 
fact  of  their  inferiority  than  to  be  nice  in  making 
distinctions.  When  we  call  both  Australians  and 
Fuegians  “ savages,”  we  do  not  assert  identity  or 
relationship  between  them ; and  so  when  the 
Northmen  called  Eskimos  and  Indians  by  the 
same  disparaging  epithet,  they  doubtless  simply 
meant  to  call  them  savages. 

Our  chronicle  describes  the  Skraelings  of  Vin- 
land  as  swarthy  in  hue,  ferocious  in  aspect,  with 
ugly  hair,  big  eyes,  and  broad  cheeks.2  This  will 
do  very  well  for  Indians,  except  as  to 

i ^ T1T  _ r _ . _ Personal 

the  eyes.  We  are  accustomed  to  think  JPP*™c®of 
of  Indian  eyes  as  small ; but  in  this 
connection  it  is,  worthy  of  note  that  a very  keen 

1 For  example,  Dr.  De  Costa  refers  to  Dr.  Abbott’s  discoveries 
as  indicating  “that  the  Indian  was  preceded  by  a people  like  the 
Eskimos,  whose  stone  implements  are  found  in  the  Trenton 
gravel.”  Pre-Columbian  Discovery , p.  132.  Quite  so ; but  that 
was  in  the  Glacial  Period  (! !),  and  when  the  edge  of  the  ice-sheet 
slowly  retreated  northward,  the  Eskimo,  who  is  emphatically  an 
Arctic  creature,  doubtless  retreated  with  it,  just  as  he  retreated 
from  Europe.  See  above,  p.  18.  There  is  not  the  slightest  rea- 
son for  supposing  that  there  were  any  Eskimos  south  of  Labrador 
so  lately  as  nine  hundred  years  ago. 

2 “ Their  voru  svartir  menn  ok  illiligir,  ok  havdhu  flit  hdr  4 
hofdhi.  Their  voru  mjok  eygdhir  ok  breidhir  1 kinnum,”  i.  e. 
“Hi  homines  erant  nigri,  truculenti  specie,  fcedam  in  capite 
comam  habentes,  oculis  magnis  et  genis  latis.”  Rafn,  p.  149.  The 
Icelandic  svartr  is  more  precisely  rendered  by  the  identical  Eng- 
lish swarthy  than  by  the  Latin  niger. 


190 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


observer,  Marc  Lescarbot,  in  his  minute  and  elab- 
orate description  of  the  physical  appearance  of  the 
Micmacs  of  Acadia,  speaks  with  some  emphasis  of 
their  large  eyes.1  Dr.  Storm  quite  reasonably 
suggests  that  the  Norse  expression  may  refer  to 
the  size  not  of  the  eye-ball,  but  of  the  eye-socket, 
which  in  the  Indian  face  is  apt  to  be  large ; and 
very  likely  this  is  what  the  Frenchman  also  had 
in  mind. 

These  Skrselings  were  clad  in  skins,  and  their 
weapons  were  bows  and  arrows,  slings,  and  stone 
hatchets.  In  the  latter  we  may  now,  I think,  be 
allowed  to  recognize  the  familiar  tomahawk ; and 
when  we  read  that,  in  a sharp  fight  with  the  na- 
tives, Thorbrand,  son  of  the  commander  Snorro, 
was  slain,  and  the  woman  Freydis  afterward  found 
his  corpse  in  the  woods,  with  a flat  stone  sticking 
in  the  head,  and  his  naked  sword  lying  on  the 
ground  beside  him,  we  seem  to  see  how  it  all  hap- 
The  Skrse-  pened.2  We  seem  to  see  the  stealthy 
Swerlin-  Indian  suddenly  dealing  the  death-blow, 
i1keniyAigVoen-y  and  then  obliged  for  his  own  safety  to 
qum8,  dart  away  among  the  trees  without  re- 

covering his  tomahawk  or  seizing  the  sword.  The 
Skrselings  came  up  the  river  or  lake  in  a swarm  of 

1 ‘ ‘ Mais  quat  k noz  Sauvages,  pour  ce  qui  regarde  les  i'eux  ilz 
ne  les  out  ni  bleuz,  ni  verds,  mais  noirs  pour  la  pluspart,  ainsi  que 
les  cheveux ; & neantmoins  ne  sont  petits,  come  ceux  des  anciens 
Scythes,  mais  d’une  grandeur  bien  agreable.”  Lescarbot,  His- 
toire  de  la  Nouvelle  France , Paris,  1612,  tom.  ii.  p.  714. 

2 “ Hain  fann  fyrir  s6r  mann  daudhan,  thar  var  Thorbrandr 
Snorrason,  ok  stodh  hellusteinn  f hofdhi  honum  ; sverdhit  14  bert 
i hjd  honum,”  i.  e.  “ Ilia  incidit  in  mortuum  hominem,  Thorbran- 
dum  Snorrii  filium,  cujus  eapiti  lapis  planus  impactus  stetit ; nu- 
dus  juxta  eum  gladius  jacuit.”  Rafn,  p.  154. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


191 


canoes,  all  yelling  at  the  top  of  their  voices  ( et 
illi  omnes  valde  acutum  ululabant ),  and,  leaping 
ashore,  began  a formidable  attack  with  slings  and 
arrows.  The  narrative  calls  these  canoes  “skin- 
boats  ” ( hudhkeipar ),  whence  it  has  been  inferred 
that  the  writer  had  in  mind  the  kayaks  and  umialcs 
of  the  Eskimos.1  I suspect  that  the  writer  did 
have  such  boats  in  mind,  and  accordingly  used  a 
word  not  strictly  accurate.  Very  likely  his  author- 
ities failed  to  specify  a distinction  between  bark- 
boats  and  skin-boats,  and  simply  used  the  handiest 
word  for  designating  canoes  as  contrasted  with 
their  own  keeled  boats.2 

One  other  point  which  must  be  noticed  here  in 
connection  with  the  Skraelings  is  a singular  ma- 
noeuvre which  they  are  said  to  have  practised  in 
the  course  of  the  fight.  They  raised  upon  the  end 
of  a pole  a big  ball,  not  unlike  a sheep’s  paunch, 
and  of  .a  bluish  colour  ; this  ball  they  swung  from 
the  pole  over  the  heads  of  the  white  men,  and 
it  fell  to  the  ground  with  a horrid  noise.3  Now, 

1 These  Eskimo  skin -boats  are  described  in  Rink’s  Danish 
Greenland , pp.  113,  179. 

2 Cf.  Storm,  op.  cit.  pp.  366,  367. 

8 “ That  s&  their  Karlsefni  at  Skrselfngar  fserdbu  upp  & stong 
knott  stundar  mykinn  thvi  naer  til  at  jafna  sem  saudharvomb,  ok 
helzt  bl&n  at  lit,  ok  fleygdhu  af  stonginni  upp  & landit  yfir  lidh 
theirra  Karlsefnis,  ok  16t  illilega  vidhr,  thar  sem  nidhr  kom. 
Vidh  thetta  sl6  6tta  myklum  & Karlsefni  ok  allt  lidh  bans,  sva  at 
thd  fysti  engis  annars  enn  flyja,  ok  halda  undan  upp  medh  dnni, 
tbviat  tbeim  th<5tti  lidh  Skraellnga  drifa  at  s6r  allum  megin,  ok 
16tta  eigi,  fyrr  enn  their  koma  til  hamra  nokkurra,  ok  veittu  thar 
vidhrtoku  hardha,”  i.  e.  “Viderunt  Karlsefniani  quod  Skraelingi 
longurio  sustulerunt  globum  ingentem,  ventri  ovillo  baud  absi- 
milem,  colore  fere  caeruleo ; hunc  ex  longurio  in  terram  super 
manum  Karlsefnianorum  contorserunt,  qui  ut  decidit,  dirum  so- 


192 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


according  to  Mr.  Schoolcraft,  this  was  a mode  of 
fighting  formerly  common  among  the  Algonquins, 
in  New  England  and  elsewhere.  This  big  ball  was 
what  Mr.  Schoolcraft  calls  the  “balista,”  or  what 
the  Indians  themselves  call  the  “demon’s  head.” 
It  was  a large  round  boulder,  sewed  up  in  a new 
skin  and  attached  to  a pole.  As  the  skin  dried  it 
enwrapped  the  stone  tightly ; and  then  it  was 
daubed  with  grotesque  devices  in  various  colours. 
“ It  was  borne  by  several  warriors  who  acted  as 
balisteers.  Plunged  upon  a boat  or  canoe,  it  was 
capable  of  sinking  it.  Brought  down  upon  a 
group  of  men  on  a sudden,  it  produced  consterna- 
tion and  death.” 1 This  is  a most  remarkable 
feature  in  the  narrative,  for  it  shows  us  the  Ice- 
landic writer  (here  manifestly  controlled  by  some 
authoritative  source  of  information)  describing  a 
very  strange  mode  of  fighting,  which  we  know 
to  have  been  characteristic  of  the  Algonquins. 
Karlsefni’s  men  do  not  seem  to  have  relished  this 
outlandish  style  of  fighting ; they  retreated  along 
the  river  bank  until  they  came  to  a favourable  situ- 
ation among  some  rocks,  where  they  made  a stand 
and  beat  off  their  swarming  assailants.  The  lat- 
ter, as  soon  as  they  found  themselves  losing  many 
warriors  without  gaining  their  point,  suddenly 

uuit.  Hac  re  terrore  perculsus  est  Karlsefnius  suique  omnes,  ut 
nihil  aliud  cuperent  quam  fugere  et  gradum  referre  sursum  secun- 
dum fluvium  : credebant  enim  se  ab  Skraelingis  undique  circum- 
veniri.  Hinc  non  gradum  stitere,  priusquam  ad  rupes  quasdam 
pervenissent,  ubi  acriter  resistebant.”  Rafn,  p.  153. 

1 Schoolcraft,  Archives  of  Aboriginal  Knowledge , Philadelphia, 
1860,  6 vols.  4to,  vol.  i.  p.  89 ; a figure  of  this  weapon  is  given  in 
the  same  volume,  plate  xv.  fig.  2,  from  a careful  description 
by  Chingwauk,  an  Algonquin  chief. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


193 


turned  and  fled  to  their  canoes,  and  paddled  away 
with  astonishing  celerity.  Throughout  the  account 
it  seems  to  me  perfectly  clear  that  we  are  dealing 
with  Indians. 

The  coexistence  of  so  many  unmistakable  marks 
of  truth  in  our  narratives  may  fairly  be  said  to 
amount  to  a demonstration  that  they  must  be  de- 
rived, through  some  eminently  trustworthy  chan- 
nel, from  the  statements  of  intelligent  eye-wit- 
nesses who  took  part  in  the  events  related.  Here 
and  there,  no  doubt,  we  come  upon  some  improb- 
able incident  or  a touch  of  superstition,  such  as 
we  need  not  go  back  to  the  eleventh 
century  to  rind  very  common  among  sea- 
men’s narratives ; but  the  remarkable  thing  in  the 
present  case  is  that  there  are  so  few  such  features. 
One  fabulous  creature  is  mentioned.  Thorfinn  and 
his  men  saw  from  their  vessel  a glittering  speck 
upon  the  shore  at  an  opening  in  the  woods.  They 
hailed  it,  whereupon  the  creature  proceeded  to  per- 
form the  quite  human  act  of  shooting  an  arrow, 
which  killed  the  man  at  the  helm.  The  narrator 
calls  it  a “uniped,”  or  some  sort  of  one-footed 
goblin,1  but  that  is  hardly  reasonable,  for  after  the 
shooting  it  went  on  to  perform  the  further  quite 
human  and  eminently  Indian-like  act  of  running 
away.2  Evidently  this  discreet  “ uniped  ” was  im- 
pressed with  the  desirableness  of  living  to  fight 

1 Rafn,  p.  160 ; De  Costa,  p.  134  ; Storm,  p.  330. 

2 Here  the  narrator  seems  determined  to  give  118  a genuine 
smack  of  the  marvellous,  for  when  the  fleeing  uniped  comes  to  a 
place  where  his  retreat  seems  cut  off  by  an  arm  of  the  sea,  he 
runs  (glides,  or  hops  ?)  across  the  water  without  sinking.  In 
Vigfusson’s  version,  however,  the  marvellous  is  eliminated,  and 


194 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


another  day.  In  a narrative  otherwise  character- 
ized by  sobriety,  such  an  instance  of  fancy,  even 
supposing  it  to  have  come  down  from  the  original 
sources,  counts  for  as  much  or  as  little  as  Henry 
Hudson’s  description  of  a mermaid.1 

It  is  now  time  for  a few  words  upon  the  charac- 
ter of  the  records  upon  which  our  story  is  based. 
And  first,  let  us  remark  upon  a possible  source  of 
misapprehension  due  to  the  associations  with  which 
a certain  Norse  word  has  been  clothed.  The  old 
Norse  narrative  - writings  are  called  “sagas,”  a 
word  which  we  are  in  the  habit  of  using  in  Eng- 
lish as  equivalent  to  legendary  or  semi-mythical 
Misleading  narratives.  To  cite  a “ saga  ” as  author- 
wTthCith?word  ity  for  a statement  seems,  therefore,  to 
“saga.”  some  people  as  inadmissible  as  to  cite  a 
fairy-tale ; and  I cannot  help  suspecting  that  to 
some  such  misleading  association  of  ideas  is  due 
the  particular  form  of  the  opinion  expressed  some 
time  ago  by  a committee  of  the  Massachusetts 
Historical  Society,  — “ that  there  is  the  same  sort 
of  reason  for  believing  in  the  existence  of  Leif 
Ericsson  that  there  is  for  believing  in  the  exist- 
ence of  Agamemnon.  They  are  both  traditions 

the  creature  simply  runs  over  the  stubble  and  disappears.  The 
incident  is  evidently  an  instance  where  the  narrative  has  been 
‘ ‘ embellished  ’ ’ by  introducing  a feature  from  ancient  classical 
writers.  The  “Monocoli,”  or  one-legged  people,  are  mentioned 
by  Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.,  vii.  2 : “ Item  hominum  genus  qui  Monocoli 
voearentur,  singulis  cruribus,  mirse  pernicitatis  ad  saltum.”  Cf. 
Aulus  Gellius,  Nodes  Atticce,  viii.  4. 

1 Between  Spitzbergen  and  Nova  Zembla,  June  15,  1608.  For 
the  description,  with  its  droll  details,  see  Purchas  his  Pil grimes, 
iii.  575. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  195 

accepted  by  later  writers,  and  there  is  no  more 

reason  for  regarding  as  true  the  details 

related  about  the  discoveries  of  the  for-  comparaon 

. , * i • p , • i . between  Leif 

mer  than  there  is  tor  accepting  as  his-  Ericsson  and 
toric  truth  the  narrative  contained  in  Agarnemnon 
the  Homeric  poems.”  The  report  goes  on  to  ob- 
serve that  “it  is  antecedently  probable  that  the 
Northmen  discovered  America  in  the  early  part  of 
the  eleventh  century ; and  this  discovery  is  con- 
firmed by  the  same  sort  of  historical  tradition,  not 
strong  enough  to  be  called  evidence,  upon  which 
our  belief  in  many  of  the  accepted  facts  of  history 
rests.”  1 The  second  of  these  statements  is  char- 
acterized by  critical  moderation,  and  expresses  the 
inevitable  and  wholesome  reaction  against  the  rash 
enthusiasm  of  Professor  Rafn  half  a century  ago, 
and  the  vagaries  of  many  an  uninstructed  or  un- 
critical writer  since  his  time.  But  the  first  state- 
ment is  singularly  unfortunate.  It  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  find  a comparison  more  inappropriate  than 
that  between  Agamemnon  and  Leif,  between  the 
Iliad  and  the  Saga  of  Eric  the  Red.  The  story  of 
the  Trojan  War  and  its  heroes,  as  we  have  it  in 
Homer  and  the  Athenian  dramatists,  is  pure  folk- 
lore as  regards  form,  and  chiefly  folk- 
lore as  regards  contents.  It  is  in  a 
high  degree  probable  that  this  mass  of  hive  it*  k 6 
folk-lore  surrounds  a kernel  of  plain  pure  folk'lore- 
fact,  that  in  times  long  before  the  first  Olympiad 
an  actual  “ king  of  men  ” at  Mycenae  conducted  an 
expedition  against  the  great  city  by  the  Simois, 
that  the  Agamemnon  of  the  poet  stands  in  some 
1 Proceedings  Mass.  Hist.  Soc.,  December,  1887. 


196 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


such  relation  toward  this  chieftain  as  that  in  which 
the  Charlemagne  of  mediaeval  romance  stands  to- 
ward the  mighty  Emperor  of  the  West.1  Never- 
theless the  story,  as  we  have  it,  is  simply  folk-lore. 
If  the  Iliad  and  Odyssey  contain  faint  reminis- 
cences of  actual  events,  these  events  are  so  inex- 
tricably wrapped  up  with  mythical  phraseology 
that  by  no  cunning  of  the  scholar  can  they  be  con- 
strued into  history.  The  motives  and  capabilities 
of  the  actors  and  the  conditions  under  which  they 
accomplish  their  destinies  are  such  as  exist  only  in 
fairy-tales.  Their  world  is  as  remote  from  that 
in  which  we  live  as  the  world  of  Sindbad  and  Ca- 
maralzaman  ; and  this  is  not  essentially  altered  by 
the  fact  that  Homer  introduces  us  to  definite  local- 
ities and  familiar  customs  as  often  as  the  Irish 
legends  of  Finn  M’Cumhail.2 

It  would  be  hard  to  find  anything  more  unlike 
such  writings  than  the  class  of  Icelandic  sagas  to 
which  that  of  Eric  the  Ked  belongs.  Here  we 
have  quiet  and  sober  narrative,  not  in 

The  Saga  of  . 

Eric  the  Red  is  the  least  like  a fairy-tale,  but  often  much 
like  a ship  s log.  Whatever  such  nar- 
rative may  be,  it  is  not  folk-lore.  In  act  and 
motive,  in  its  conditions  and  laws,  its  world  is  the 
every-day  world  in  which  we  live.  If  now  and 
then  a “ uniped  ” happens  to  stray  into  it,  the  in- 

1 I used  this  argument  twenty  years  ago  in  qualification  of  the 
over-zealous  solarizing  views  of  Sir  G.  W.  Cox  and  others.  See 
my  Myths  and  MythmaJcers,  pp.  191-202 ; and  cf.  Freeman  on 
“ The  Mythical  and  Romantic  Elements  in  Early  English  History,  ’ ’ 
in  his  Historical  Essays,  i.  1-39. 

2 Curtin,  Myths  and  Folk-Lore  of  Ireland,  pp.  12,  204,  303  ; 
Kennedy,  Legendary  Fictions  of  the  Irish  Celts,  pp.  203-311. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


197 


congruity  is  as  conspicuous  as  in  the  case  of  Hud- 
son’s mermaid,  or  a ghost  in  a modem  country 
inn ; whereas  in  the  Homeric  fabric  the  super- 
natural is  warp  and  woof.  To  assert  a likeness 
between  two  kinds  of  literature  so  utterly  different 
is  to  go  very  far  astray. 

As  already  observed,  I suspect  that  misleading 
associations  with  the  word  “ saga  ” may  have 
exerted  an  unconscious  influence  in  producing  this 
particular  kind  of  blunder,  — for  it  is  nothing  less 
than  a blunder.  Resemblance  is  tacitly  assumed 
between  the  Iliad  and  an  Icelandic  saga.  Well, 
between  the  Iliad  and  some  Icelandic  sagas  there 
is  a real  and  strong  resemblance.  In  truth  these 
sagas  are  divisible  into  two  well  marked  and 
sharply  contrasted  classes.  In  the  one  class  be- 
long the  Eddie  Lays,  and  the  mythical  sagas , such 
as  the  Volsunga,  the  stories  of  Ragnar,  Mythical  and 
Frithiof,  and  others  ; and  along  with  historical 
these,  though  totally  different  in  source, 
we  may  for  our  present  purpose  group  the  roman- 
tic sagas , such  as  Parceval,  Remund,  Karlamag- 
nus,  and  others  brought  from  southern  Europe. 
These  are  alike  in  being  composed  of  legendary 
and  mythical  materials  ; they  belong  essentially  to 
the  literature  of  folk-lore.  In  the  other  class 
come  the  historical  sagas , such  as  those  of  Njal 
and  Egil,  the  Sturlunga,  and  many  others,  with 
the  numerous  biographies  and  annals.1  These 

1 Nowhere  can  you  find  a more  masterly  critical  account  of 
Icelandic  literature  than  in  Vigfusson’s  “ Prolegomena  ” to  his 
edition  of  Sturlunga  Saga,  Oxford,  1878,  vol.  i.  pp.  ix.-ccxiv. 
There  is  a good  hut  very  brief  account  in  Horn’s  History  of  the 


198 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


writings  give  us  history,  and  often  very  good  his- 
tory indeed.  “ Saga  ” meant  simply  any  kind  of 
literature  in  narrative  form;  the  good  people  of 
Iceland  did  not  happen  to  have  such  a handy 
word  as  “ history,”  which  they  could  keep  entire 
when  they  meant  it  in  sober  earnest  and  chop 
down  into  “ story”  when  they  meant  it  otherwise. 
It  is  very  much  as  if  we  were  to  apply  the  same 
word  to  the  Arthur  legends  and  to  William  of 
Malmesbury’s  judicious  and  accurate  chronicles, 
and  call  them  alike  “ stories.” 

The  narrative  upon  which  our  account  of  the 
Yinland  voyages  is  chiefly  based  belongs  to  the 
class  of  historical  sagas.  It  is  the  Saga  of  Eric 
the  Red,  and  it  exists  in  two  different  versions,  of 
which  one  seems  to  have  been  made  in  the  north, 
the  other  in  the  west,  of  Iceland.  The  western 
version  is  the  earlier  and  in  some  respects  the 
The  western  or  ketter*  It  is  found  in  two  vellums,  that 
versk)nbofkEric  great  collection  known  as  Hauks- 

the  Red’s  saga,  (AM.  544),  and  that  which  is 
simply  known  as  AM.  557  from  its  catalogue 
number  in  Arni  Magnusson’s  collection.  Of  these 
the  former,  which  is  the  best  preserved,  was  writ- 
ten in  a beautiful  hand  by  Hauk  Erlendsson, 
between  1805  and  1884,  the  year  of  his  death. 
This  western  version  is  the  one  which  has  generally 
been  printed  under  the  title,  “ Saga  of  Thorfinn 
Karlsefni.”  It  is  the  one  to  which  I have  most 
frequently  referred  in  the  present  chapter.1 


Literature  of  the  Scandinavian  North,  transl.  by  R.  B.  Anderson, 
Chicago,  1884,  pp.  50-70. 

1 It  is  printed  in  Rafn,  pp.  84-187,  and  in  Gronlands  historiske 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


199 


The  northern  version  is  that  which  was  made 
about  the  year  1387  by  the  priest  Jon  Thordhar- 
son,  and  contained  in  the  famous  compilation 
known  as  the  Flateyar-boh , or  “ Flat  Island 
Book.”1  This  priest  was  editing  the  _ 

F ° . The  northern 

saga  of  King  Olaf  Tryggvesson,  which  or  F^yar- 
is  contained  in  that  compilation,  and 
inasmuch  as  Leif  Ericsson’s  presence  at  King 
Olaf’s  court  was  connected  both  with  the  introduc- 
tion of  Christianity  into  Greenland  and  with  the 
discovery  of  Vinland,  Jon  paused,  after  the  man- 
ner of  mediaeval  chroniclers,  and  inserted  then  and 
there  what  he  knew  about  Eric  and  Leif  and  Thor- 
finn.  In  doing  this,  he  used  parts  of  the  original 
saga  of  Eric  the  Red  (as  we  find  it  reproduced  in 
the  western  version),  and  added  thereunto  a con- 
siderable amount  of  material  concerning  the  Vin- 
land voyages  derived  from  other  sources.  Jon’s 
version  thus  made  has  generally  been  printed  under 
the  title,  “ Saga  of  Eric  the  Red.”  2 

Now  the  older  version,  written  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  fourteenth  century,  gives  an  account 
of  things  which  happened  three  centuries  before  it 
was  written.  A cautious  scholar  will,  as  a rule,  be 
slow  to  consider  any  historical  narrative  as  quite 

Mindesmcerker , i.  352-443.  The  most  essential  part  of  it  may 
now  be  found,  under  its  own  name,  in  Vigfusson’s  Icelandic  Prose 
Reader , pp.  123-140. 

1 It  belonged  to  a man  who  lived  on  Flat  Island,  in  one  of  the 
Iceland  fiords. 

2 It  is  printed  in  Rafn,  pp.  1-76,  under  the  title  “ Thaettir  af 
Eireki  Rauda  ok  Graenlendlngum.”  For  a critical  account  of 
these  versions,  see  Storm,  op.  cit.  pp.  319-325  ; I do  not,  in  all  re- 
spects, follow  him  in  his  depreciation  of  the  Flateyar-b6k  version. 


200  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

satisfactory  authority,  even  when  it  contains  no  im- 
Presumption  probable  statements,  unless  it  is  nearly 
sources  not  contemporary  with  the  events  which  it 
contemporary.  recorc[s<  Such  was  the  rule  laid  down 
by  the  late  Sir  George  Cornewall  Lewis,  and  it 
is  a very  good  rule ; the  proper  application  of  it 
has  disencumbered  history  of  much  rubbish.  At 
the  same  time,  like  all  rules,  it  should  be  used  with 
judicious  caution  and  not  allowed  to  run  away  with 
us.  As  applied  by  Lewis  to  Eoman  history  it 
would  have  swept  away  in  one  great  cataclysm  not 
only  kings  and  decemvirs,  but  Brennus  and  his 
Gauls  to  boot,  and  left  us  with  nothing  to  swear 
by  until  the  invasion  of  Pyrrhus.1  Subsequent  re- 
search has  shown  that  this  was  going  altogether  too 
far.  The  mere  fact  of  distance  in  time  between  a 
document  and  the  events  which  it  records  is  only 
negative  testimony  against  its  value,  for  it  may  be 
a faithful  transcript  of  some  earlier  document  or 
documents  since  lost.  It  is  so  difficult  to  prove 
a negative  that  the  mere  lapse  of  time  simply 
raises  a presumption  the  weight  of  which  should 
be  estimated  by  a careful  survey  of  all  the  prob- 
abilities in  the  case.  Among  the  many  Icelandic 
vellums  that  are  known  to  have  perished2  there 

1 Lewis’s  Inquiry  into  the  Credibility  of  the  Early  Roman  His- 
tory, 2 vols.,  London,  1855. 

2 And  notably  in  that  terrible  fire  of  October,  1728,  which 
consumed  the  University  Library  at  Copenhagen,  and  broke  the 
heart  of  the  noble  collector  of  manuscripts,  Arni  Magnusson.  The 
great  eruption  of  Hecla  in  1390  overwhelmed  two  famous  home- 
steads in  the  immediate  neighbourhood.  From  the  local  history 
of  these  homesteads  and  their  inmates,  Vigfusson  thinks  it  not 
unlikely  that  some  records  may  still  be  there  ‘ 1 awaiting  the  spade 
and  pickaxe  of  a new  Schliemann.”  Sturlunga  Saga , p.  cliv. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  201 

may  well  have  been  earlier  copies  of  Eric  the 
Red’s  Saga. 

Hauk  Erlendsson  reckoned  himself  a direct  de- 
scendant, in  the  eighth  generation,  from  Snorro, 
son  of  Thorfinn  and  Gudrid,  bom  in  Vinland. 
He  was  an  important  personage  in  Iceland,  a man 
of  erudition,  author  of  a brief  book  of  contempo- 
rary annals  and  a treatise  on  arithmetic  in  which 
he  introduced  the  Arabic  numerals  into  Iceland. 
In  those  days  the  lover  of  books,  if  he 
would  add  them  to  his  library,  might  sod  and  bis 

, i , • . . , manuscripts. 

now  and  then  obtain  an  original  manu- 
script, but  usually  he  had  to  copy  them  or  have 
them  copied  by  hand.  The  Hauks-bok,  with  its 
200  skins,  one  of  the  most  extensive  Icelandic  vel- 
lums now  in  existence,  is  really  Hauk’s  private 
library,  or  what  there  is  left  of  it,  and  it  shows  that 
he  was  a man  who  knew  how  to  make  a good 
choice  of  books.  He  did  a good  deal  of  his  copy- 
ing himself,  and  also  employed  two  clerks  in  the 
same  kind  of  work.1 

Now  I do  not  suppose  it  will  occur  to  any 
rational  being  to  suggest  that  Hauk  may  have 
written  down  his  version  of  Eric  the  Red’s  Saga 
from  an  oral  tradition  nearly  three  centuries  old. 
The  narrative  could  not  have  been  so  long  pre- 
served in  its  integrity,  with  so  little  extravagance 
of  statement  and  so  many  marks  of  truthfulness  in 
details  foreign  to  ordinary  Icelandic  experience,  if 

1 An  excellent  facsimile  of  Hauk’s  handwriting  is  given  in 
Rafn,  tab.  iii.,  lower  part  ; tab.  iv.  and  the  upper  part  of  tab. 
iii.  are  in  the  hands  of  his  two  amanuenses.  See  Vigfusson, 
op.  cit.  p.  clxi. 


202  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

it  had  been  entrusted  to  oral  tradition  alone.  One 
might  as  well  try  to  imagine  Drake’s 
not  likely  to  “World  Encompassed”  handed  down 
sjpvedTo  pre*  by  oral  tradition  from  the  days  of  Queen 
by  oral  tradi-  Elizabeth  to  the  days  of  Queen  Victoria. 

Such  transmission  is  possible  enough 
with  heroic  poems  and  folk-tales,  which  deal  with 
a few  dramatic  situations  and  a stock  of  mythical 
conceptions  familiar  at  every  fireside ; but  in  a 
simple  matter-of-fact  record  of  sailors’  observa- 
tions and  experiences  on  a strange  coast,  oral 
tradition  would  not  be  long  in  distorting  and 
jumbling  the  details  into  a result  quite  undecipher- 
able. The  story  of  the  Zeno  brothers,  presently  to 
be  cited,  shows  what  strange  perversions  occur, 
even  in  written  tradition^  when  the  copyist,  instead 
of  faithfully  copying  records  of  unfamiliar  events, 
tries  to  edit  and  amend  them.  One  cannot  reason- 
ably doubt  that  Hauk’s  vellum  of  Eric  the  Red’s 
Saga,  with  its  many  ear-marks  of  truth  above  men- 
tioned, was  copied  by  him  — and  quite  carefully 
and  faithfully  withal  — from  some  older  vellum 
not  now  forthcoming. 

As  we  have  no  clue,  however,  beyond  the  inter- 
nal evidence,  to  the  age  or  character  of  the  sources 
from  which  Hauk  copied,  there  is  nothing  left  for 
Allusions  to  us  to  do  but  to  look  into  other  Icelandic 

othSndocu-  documents,  to  see  if  anywhere  they  be- 

ments.  tray  a knowledge  of  Vinland  and  the 

voyages  thither.  Incidental  references  to  Vinland, 
in  narratives  concerned  with  other  matters,  are  of 
great  significance  in  this  connection ; for  they  im- 
ply on  the  part  of  the  narrator  a presumption  that 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


203 


his  readers  understand  such  references,  and  that  it 
is  not  necessary  to  interrupt  his  story  in  order  to 
explain  them.  Such  incidental  references  imply 
the  existence,  during  the  interval  between  the 
Vinland  voyages  and  Hauk’s  manuscript,  of  many 
intermediate  links  of  sound  testimony  that  have 
since  dropped  out  of  sight ; and  therefore  they  go 
far  toward  removing  whatever  presumption  may 
be  alleged  against  Hauk’s  manuscript  because  of 
its  distance  from  the  events. 

Now  the  Eyrbyggja  Saga,  written  between  1230 
and  1260,  is  largely  devoted  to  the  settlement  of 
Iceland,  and  is  full  of  valuable  notices  of  the  hear 
then  institutions  and  customs  of  the  tenth  cen- 
tury.  The  Eyrbyggja,  having  occasion  Eyrtmja 
to  speak  of  Thorbrand  Snorrason,  ob-  8aga- 
serves  incidentally  that  he  went  from  Greenland 
to  Vinland  with  Karlsefni  and  was  killed;  in  a bat- 
tle with  the  Skrselings.1  We  have  already  men- 
tioned the  death  of  this  Thorbrand,  and  how  Frey- 
dis  found  his  body  in  the  woods. 

Three  Icelandic  tracts  on  geography,  between 
the  twelfth  and  fourteenth  centuries,  mention  Hel- 
luland  and  Vinland,  and  in  two  of  these  accounts 
Markland  is  interposed  between  Helluland  and 
Vinland.2  One  of  these  tracts  mentions  the  voy- 
ages of  Leif,  and  Thorfinn.  It  forms  part  of  an 
essay  called  “ Guide  to  the  Holy  Land,”  by  Nik- 

1 Vigfusson,  Eyrbyggja  Saga , pp.  91,  92.  Another  of  Karlsef- 
ni’s  comrades,  Thorhall  Gamlason,  is  mentioned  in  Grettis  Saga , 
Copenhagen,  1859,  pp.  22,  70 ; he  went  hack  to  Iceland,  settled 
on  a farm  there,  and  was  known  for  the  rest  of  his  life  as  “ the 
Vinlander.”  See  above,  pp.  165,  168. 

2 Werlauf,  Symbolce  ad  Geogr.  Medii  jEvi,  Copenhagen,  1820. 


204  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


ulas  Saemundsson,  abbot  of  Thvera,  in  the  north 
The  abbot  Iceland,  who  died  1159.  This  Nik- 
Nikuias,  etc.  uias  was  curi0us  in  matters  of  geogra- 
phy, and  had  travelled  extensively. 

With  the  celebrated  Ari  Thorgilsson,  usually 
known  as  Frodhi,  “ the  learned,’’  we  come  to  tes- 
timony nearly  contemporaneous  in  time  and  ex- 
tremely valuable  in  character.  This  erudite  priest, 
born  in  1067,  was  the  founder  of  historical  writing 
in  Iceland.  He  was  the  principal  author  of  the 
“ Landnama-bok,”  already  mentioned  as  a work 
of  thorough  and  painstaking  research 
unequalled  in  mediaeval  literature.  His 
other  principal  works  were  the  “ Konunga-bok,” 
or  chronicle  of  the  kings  of  Norway,  and  the 
“ Islendinga-bok,”  or  description  of  Iceland.1  Ari’s 
books,  written  not  in  monkish  Latin,  but  in  a good 
vigorous  vernacular,  were  a mine  of  information 
from  which  all  subsequent  Icelandic  historians 
were  accustomed  to  draw  such  treasures  as  they 
needed.  To  his  diligence  and  acumen  they  were 
all,  from  Snorro  Sturlason  down,  very  much  in- 
debted. He  may  be  said  to  have  given  the  tone 
to  history-writing  in  Iceland,  and  it  was  a high 
tone. 

Unfortunately  Ari’s  Islendinga-bok  has  per- 
ished. One  cannot  help  suspecting  that  it  may 
have  contained  the  contemporary  materials  from 
which  Eric  the  Red’s  Saga  in  the  Hauks-bok  was 


1 For  a critical  estimate  of  Ari’s  literary  activity  and  the  ex- 
tent of  his  work,  the  reader  is  referred  to  Mobius,  Are's  Islander- 
buck, , Leipsic,  1869;  Maurer,  “Uber  Ari  Thorgilsson  und  sein 
Islanderbuch,”  in  Germania,  xv.  ; Olsen,  Ari  Thorgilsson  hinn 
Frddhi,  Reykjavik,  1889,  pp.  214-240. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES . 


205 


ultimately  drawn.  For  Ari  made  an  abridgment 
or  epitome  of  bis  great  book,  and  this  epitome, 
commonly  known  as  “ Libellus  Islandorum,”  still 
survives.  In  it  Ari  makes  brief  mention  of  Green- 
land, and  refers  to  his  paternal  uncle,  Thorkell 
Gellison,  as  authority  for  his  statements.  This 
Thorkell  Gellison,  of  Helgafell,  a man  of  high 
consideration  who  flourished  about  the 
middle  of  the  eleventh  century,  had  vis- 
ited  Greenland  and  talked  with  one  of  to  VlDland' 
the  men  who  accompanied  Eric  when  he  went  to 
settle  in  Brattahlid  in  986.  From  this  source  Ari 
gives  us  the  interesting  information  that  Eric’s 
party  found  in  Greenland  “ traces  of  human  habi- 
tations, fragments  of  boats,  and  stone  implements  ; 
so  from  this  one  might  conclude  that  people  of  the 
kind  who  inhabited  Vinland  and  were  known  by 
the  (Norse)  Greenlanders  as  Skrselings  must  have 
roamed  about  there.”  1 Observe  the  force  of  this 
allusion.  The  settlers  in  Greenland  did  not  at 
first  (nor  for  a long  time)  meet  with  barbarous  or 
savage  natives  there,  but  only  with  the  vestiges  of 
their  former  presence.  But  when  Ari  wrote  the 
above  passage,  the  memory  of  Viniand  and  its 
fierce  Skrselings  was  still  fresh,  and  Ari  very  prop- 
erly inferred  from  the  archaeological  remains  in 

1 Their  “ fundo  thar  manna  vister  bsethi  austr  ok  vestr  d landi 
ok  kaeiplabrot  ok  steinsmlthi,  that  es  af  thvi  md  scilja,  at  thar 
hafdhi  thessconar  thjdth  farith  es  Vinland  hefer  bygt,  ok  Grsen- 
lendlnger  calla  Skrellnga,”  i.  e.  “ invenerunt  ibi,  tam  in  orientali 
quam  occidentali  terras  parte,  humanse  habitation  is  vestigia,  navi- 
cularum  fragmenta  et  opera  fabrilia  ex  lapide,  ex  quo  intelligi 
potest,  ibi  versatum  esse  nationem  quae  Vinlandiam  incoluit  quam- 
que  Greenlandi  Skraelingos  appellant.”  Rain,  p.  207- 


206 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


Greenland  that  a people  similar  (in  point  of  bar- 
barism) to  the  Skraelings  must  have  been  there. 
Unless  Ari  and  his  readers  had  a distinct  recollec- 
tion of  the  accounts  of  Yinland,  such  a reference 
would  have  been  only  an  attempt  to  explain  the 
less  obscure  by  the  more  obscure.  It  is  to  be  re- 
gretted that  we  have  in  this  book  no  more  allusions 
to  Yinland;  but  if  Ari  could  only  leave  us  one 
such  allusion,  he  surely  could  not  have  made  that 
one  more  pointed. 

But  this  is  not  quite  the  only  reference  that  Ari 
makes  to  Yinland.  There  are  three  others  that 
must  in  all  probability  be  assigned  to  him.  Two 
occur  in  the  Landnama-bok,  the  first  in  a pas- 
sage where  mention  is  made  of  Ari  Marsson’s  voy- 
age to  a place  in  the  western  ocean  near  Yin- 
land ; 1 the  only  point  in  this  allusion  which  need 
here  concern  us  is  that  Yinland  is  tacitly  assumed 
other  refer-  t°  a known  geographical  situation  to 

ences.  which  others  may  be  referred.  The  sec- 

ond reference  occurs  in  one  of  those  elaborate  and 
minutely  specific  genealogies  in  the  Landnama- 
bok  : “ Their  son  was  Thordhr  Hest-hofdhi,  fa- 
ther of  Karlsefni,  who  found  Yinland  the  Good, 
Snorri’s  father,”  etc.2  The  third  reference  occurs 
in  the  Kristni  Saga,  a kind  of  supplement  to  the 
Landnama-bok,  giving  an  account  of  the  intro- 
duction of  Christianity  into  Iceland ; here  it  is  re- 
lated how  Leif  Ericsson  came  to  be  called  “ Leif 
the  Lucky,”  1.  from  having  rescued  a shipwrecked 
crew  off  the  coast  of  Greenland,  2.  from  having 

1 Landnama-bdJc , part  ii.  chap.  xxii. 

2 Id.  part  iii.  chap.  x. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


207 


discovered  “ Yinland  the  Good.”  1 From  these 
brief  allusions,  and  from  the  general  relation  in 
which  Ari  Frodhi  stood  to  later  writers,  I suspect 
that  if  the  greater  Islendinga-bok  had  survived 
to  our  time  we  should  have  found  in  it  more  about 
Yinland  and  its  discoverers.  At  any  rate,  as  to 
the  existence  of  a definite  and  continuous  tradition 
all  the  way  from  Ari  down  to  Hauk  Erlendsson, 
there  can  be  no  question  whatever.2 

1 Kristni  Saga,  apud  Biskupa  Sogur , Copenhagen,  1858,  vol.  i. 

p.  20. 

2 Indeed,  the  parallel  existence  of  the  Flateyar-b<5k  version  of 
Eric  the  Red’s  Saga,  alongside  of  the  Hauks-b<5k  version,  is  pretty 
good  proof  of  the  existence  of  a written  account  older  than  Hank’s 
time.  The  discrepancies  between  the  two  versions  are  such  as  to 
show  that  J<5n  Thordharson  did  not  copy  from  Hauk,  but  followed 
some  other  version  not  now  forthcoming.  J<5n  mentions  six  voy- 
ages in  connection  with  Vinland : 1.  Bjami  Herjulfsson ; 2.  Leif ; 
3.  Thorvald ; 4.  Thorstein  and  Gudrid ; 5.  Thorfinn  Karlsefni ; 
6.  Freydis.  Hauk,  on  the  other  hand,  mentions  only  the  two 
principal  voyages,  those  of  Leif  and  Thorfinn ; ignoring  Bjarni, 
he  accredits  his  adventures  to  Leif  on  his  return  voyage  from 
Norway  in  999,  and  he  makes  Thorvald  a comrade  of  Thorfinn, 
and  mixes  his  adventures  with  the  events  of  Thorfinn’s  voyage. 
Dr.  Storm  considers  Hauk’s  account  intrinsically  the  more  prob- 
able, and  thinks  that  in  the  Flateyar-b<5k  we  have  a later  amplifi- 
cation of  the  tradition.  But  while  I agree  with  Dr.  Storm  as  to 
the  general  superiority  of  the  Hauk  version,  I am  not  convinced 
by  his  arguments  on  this  point.  It  seems  to  me  likely  that  the 
Flateyar-b<5k  here  preserves  more  faithfully  the  details  of  an  older 
tradition  too  summarily  epitomized  in  the  Hauks-b<5k.  As  the 
point  in  no  way  affects  the  general  conclusions  of  the  present 
chapter,  it  is  hardly  worth  arguing  here.  The  main  thing  for  us 
is  that  the  divergencies  between  the  two  versions,  when  coupled 
with  their  agreement  in  the  most  important  features,  indicate 
that  both  writers  were  working  upon  the  basis  of  an  antecedent 
written  tradition,  like  the  authors  of  the  first  and  third  synoptic 
gospels.  Only  here,  of  course,  there  are  in  the  divergencies  no 
symptoms  of  what  the  Tubingen  school  would  call  “ tendenz ,” 
impairing  and  obscuring  to  an  indeterminate  extent  the  general 


208 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


The  testimony  of  Adam  of  Bremen  brings  us  yet 
one  generation  nearer  to  the  Yinland  voyages,  and 
Adam  of  Bre-  is  very  significant.  Adam  was  much 
interested  in  the  missionary  work  in 
the  north  of  Europe,  and  in  1078,  the  same  year 
that  Hildebrand  was  elected  to  the  papacy,  he  pub- 
lished his  famous  “ Historia  Ecclesiastical  ’ in 
which  he  gave  an  account  of  the  conversion  of  the 
northern  nations  from  the  time  of  Leo  III.  to  that 
of  Hildebrand’s  predecessor.  In  prosecuting  his 
studies,  Adam  made  a visit  to  the  court  of  Swend 
Estridhsen,  king  of  Denmark,  nephew  of  Cnut  the 
Great,  king  of  Denmark  and  England.  Swend’s 
reign  began  in  1047,  so  that  Adam’s  visit  must 
have  occurred  between  that  date  and  1073.  The 
voyage  of  Leif  and  Thorfinn  would  at  that  time 
have  been  within  the  memory  of  living  men,  and 
would  be  likely  to  be  known  in  Denmark,  because 
the  intercourse  between  the  several  parts  of  the 
Scandinavian  world  was  incessant ; there  was  con- 
tinual coming  and  going.  Adam  learned  what  he 
could  of  Scandinavian  geography,  and  when  he 
published  his  history,  he  did  just  what  a modern 
writer  would  do  under  similar  circumstances;  he 
appended  to  his  book  some  notes  on  the  geography 
of  those  remote  countries,  then  so  little  known  to 
his  readers  in  central  and  southern  Europe.  After 
giving  some  account  of  Denmark,  Sweden,  and 
Norway,  he  describes  the  colony  in  Iceland,  and 

trustworthiness  of  the  narratives.  On  the  whole,  it  is  pretty  clear 
that  Hauks-b(5k  and  Flateyar-b<$k  were  independent  of  each  other, 
and  collated,  each  in  its  own  way,  earlier  documents  that  have 
probably  since  perished. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


209 


then  the  further  colony  in  Greenland,  and  con- 
cludes by  saying  that  out  in  that  ocean  there  is  an- 
other country,  or  island,  which  has  been  visited  by 
many  persons,  and  is  called  Vinland  because  of 
wild  grapes  that  grow  there,  out  of  which  a very 
good  wine  can  be  made.  Either  rumour  had  exag- 
gerated the  virtues  of  fox-grape  juice,  or  the 
Northmen  were  not  such  good  judges  of  wine  as  of 
ale.  Adam  goes  on  to  say  that  corn,  likewise, 
grows  in  Vinland  without  cultivation ; and  as  such 
a statement  to  European  readers  must  needs  have 
a smack  of  falsehood,  he  adds  that  it  is  based  not 
upon  fable  and  guess-work,  but  upon  “trustworthy 
reports  ( certa  relatione)  of  the  Danes.” 

Scanty  as  it  is,  this  single  item  of  strictly  con- 
temporary testimony  is  very  important,  because 
quite  incidentally  it  gives  to  the  later  accounts  such 
confirmation  as  to  show  that  they  rest  upon  a solid 
basis  of  continuous  tradition  and  not  upon  mere 
unintelligent  hearsay.1  The  unvarying  character 
of  the  tradition,  in  its  essential  details,  indicates 
that  it  must  have  been  committed  to  writing  at  a 
very  early  period,  probably  not  later  than  the  time 
of  Ari’s  uncle  Thorkell,  who  was  contemporary 
with  Adam  of  Bremen.  If,  however,  we  read  the 

1 It  is  further  interesting  as  the  only  undoubted  reference  to 
Vinland  in  a mediaeval  book  written  beyond  the  limits  of  the 
Scandinavian  world.  There  is  also,  however,  a passage  in  Orderi- 
cus  Vitalis  ( Historia  Ecclesiastica,  iv.  29),  in  which  Finland  and 
the  Orkneys,  along  with  Greenland  and  Iceland,  are  loosely  de- 
scribed as  forming  part  of  the  dominions  of  the  kings  of  Norway. 
This  Finland  does  not  appear  to  refer  to  the  country  of  the  Finns, 
east  of  the  Baltic,  and  it  has  been  supposed  that  it  may  have  been 
meant  for  Vinland.  The  book  of  Ordericus  was  written  about 
1140. 


210 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


whole  passage  in  which  Adam’s  mention  of  Yinland 
occurs,  it  is  clear  from  the  context  that  his  own 
information  was  not  derived  from  an  inspection  of 
Icelandic  documents.  He  got  it,  as  he  tells  us,  by 
talking  with  King  Swend ; and  all  that  he  got,  or 
all  that  he  thought  worth  telling,  was  this  curious 
fact  about  vines  and  self-sown  corn  growing  so 

near  to  Greenland;  for  Adam  quite 

Adam’s  mis-  . . . 

conception  of  misconceived  the  situation  of  Yinland, 

the  situation.  . . . 

and  imagined  it  far  up  m the  frozen 
North.  After  his  mention  of  Yinland,  the  conti- 
nental character  of  which  he  evidently  did  not  sus- 
pect, he  goes  on  immediately  to  say,  “After  this 
island  nothing  inhabitable  is  to  be  found  in  that 
ocean,  all  being  covered  with  unendurable  ice  and 
boundless  darkness.”  That  most  accomplished 
king,  Harold  Hardrada,  says  Adam,  tried  not 
long  since  to  ascertain  how  far  the  northern  ocean 
extended,  and  plunged  along  through  this  darkness 
until  he  actually  reached  the  end  of  the  world,  and 
came  near  tumbling  off  ! 1 Thus  the  worthy  Adam, 


1 The  passage  irom  Adam  of  Bremen  deserves  to  be  quoted  in 
full : “ Praeterea  unam  adhue  insulam  [regionam]  recitavit  [i.  e. 
Svendus  rex]  a multis  in  eo  repertam  oceano,  quae  dicitur  Yin- 
land,  eo  quod  ibi  vites  sponte  nascantur,  vinum  bonum  gerentes 
[ferentes]  ; nam  et  fruges  ibi  non  seminatas  abundare,  non  fabu- 
losa  opinione,  sed  certa  comperimus  relatione  Danorum.  Post 
quam  insulam  terra  nulla  invenitur  habitabilis  in  illo  oceano,  sed 
omnia  quae  ultra  sunt  glacie  intolerabili  ac  caligine  immensa 
plena  sunt ; cujus  rei  Marcianus  ita  meminit : ultra  Thyle,  in- 
quiens,  navigare  unius  diei  mare  concretum  est.  Tentavit  hoc 
nuper  experientissimus  Nordmannorum  princeps  Haroldus,  qui 
latitudinem  septentrionalis  oceani  perscrutatus  navibus,  tandem 
caligantibus  ante  ora  deficientis  mundi  finibus,  immane  abyssi 
baratrum,  retroactis  vestigiis,  vix  salvus  evasit.’'  Descriptio  in - 
sularum  aquilonis , cap.  38,  apud  Hist.  Ecclesiastica,  iv.  ed.  Lin- 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


211 


while  telling  the  truth  about  fox-grapes  and  maize 
as  well  as  he  knew  how,  spoiled  the  effect  of  his 
story  by  putting  Vinland  in  the  Arctic  regions. 
The  juxtaposition  of  icebergs  and  vines  was  a little 
too  close  even  for  the  mediaeval  mind  so  hospitable 
to  strange  yarns.  Adam’s  readers  generally  dis- 
believed the  “trustworthy  reports  of  the  Danes,” 
and  when  they  thought  of  Vinland  at  all,  doubt- 
less thought  of  it  as  somewhere  near  the  North 
Pole.1  We  shall  do  well  to  bear  this  in  mind  when 
we  come  to  consider  the  possibility  of  Columbus 
having  obtained  from  Adam  of  Bremen  any  hint 
in  the  least  likely  to  be  of  use  in  his  own  enter- 
prise.2 

To  sum  up  the  argument : — we  have  in  Eric  the 
Red’s  Saga,  as  copied  by  Hauk  Erlends-  summary  of 
son,  a document  for  the  existence  of  the  ar&ument- 
which  we  are  required  to  account.  That  document 

denbrog,  Leyden,  1595.  No  such  voyage  is  known  to  have  been 
undertaken  by  Harold  of  Norway,  nor  is  it  likely.  Adam  was 
probably  thinking  of  an  Arctic  voyage  undertaken  by  one  Thorir 
under  the  auspices  of  King  Harold ; one  of  the  company  brought 
back  a polar  bear  and  gave  it  to  King  Swend,  who  was  much 
pleased  with  it.  See  Rafn,  339.  “ Regionam  ” and  “ ferentes  ” 

in  the  above  extract  are  variant  readings  found  in  some  editions. 

1 “ Det  har  imidlertid  ikke  forhindret  de  senere  forfattere,  der 
benyttede  Adam,  fra  at  blive  mistaenksomme,  og  saalaenge  Adams 
beretning  stod  alene,  har  man  i regelen  vsegret  sig  for  at  tro  den. 
Endog  den  norske  forfatter,  der  skrev  ‘ Historia  Norvegiae  ’ og 
somforuden  Adam  vel  ogsaa  har  kjendt  de  hjemlige  sagn  om  Vin- 
land, maa  have  anseet  beretningen  for  fabelagtig  og  derfor  for- 
bigaaet  den ; han  kjendte  altf or  godt  Gr0nland  som  et  nordligt 
isfyldt  Polarland  til  at  ville  tro  paa,  at  i naerheden  fandtes  et 
Vinland.”  Storm,  in  Aarbpger  for  NordisJc  Oldkyndighed,  etc., 
Copenhagen,  1887,  p.  300. 

2 See  below,  p.  386. 


212 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


contains  unmistakable  knowledge  of  some  things 
which  mediaeval  Europeans  could  by  no  human 
possibility  have  learned,  except  through  a visit  to 
some  part  of  the  coast  of  North  America  further 
south  than  Labrador  or  Newfoundland.  It  tells 
an  eminently  probable  story  in  a simple,  straight- 
forward way,  agreeing  in  its  details  with  what  we 
know  of  the  North  American  coast  between  Point 
Judith  and  Cape  Breton.  Its  general  accuracy 
in  the  statement  and  grouping  of  so  many  remote 
details  is  proof  that  its  statements  were  controlled 
by  an  exceedingly  strong  and  steady  tradition,  — 
altogether  too  strong  and  steady,  in  my  opinion,  to 
have  been  maintained  simply  by  word  of  mouth. 
These  Icelanders  were  people  so  much  given  to 
writing  that  their  historic  records  during  the  Mid- 
dle Ages  were,  as  the  late  Sir  Richard  Burton 
truly  observed,  more  complete  than  those  of  any 
other  country  in  Europe.1  It  is  probable  that  the 
facts  mentioned  in  Hauk’s  document  rested  upon 
some  kind  of  a written  basis  as  early  as  the  elev- 
enth century;  and  it  seems  quite  clear  that  the 
constant  tradition,  by  which  all  the  allusions  to 
V inland  and  the  Skrselings  are  controlled,  had  be- 
come established  by  that  time.  The  data  are  more 
scanty  than  we  could  wish,  but  they  all  point  in 
the  same  direction  as  surely  as  straws  blown  by  a 
steady  wind,  and  their  cumulative  force  is  so  great 
as  to  fall  but  little  short  of  demonstration.  For 
these  reasons  it  seems  to  me  that  the  Saga  of  Eric 
the  Red  should  be  accepted  as  history;  and  there 
is  another  reason  which  might  not  have  counted 
1 Burton,  Ultima  Thule , London,  1875,  i.  237. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


213 


for  much  at  the  beginning  of  this  discussion,  but 
at  the  end  seems  quite  solid  and  worthy  of  respect. 
The  narrative  begins  with  the  colonization  of 
Greenland  and  goes  on  with  the  visits  to  Vinland. 
It  is  unquestionably  sound  history  for  the  first 
part;  why  should  it  be  anything  else  for  the  second 
part?  What  shall  be  said  of  a style  of  criticism 
which,  in  dealing  with  one  and  the  same  document, 
arbitrarily  cuts  it  in  two  in  the  middle  and  calls 
the  first  half  history  and  the  last  half  legend? 
which  accepts  its  statements  as  serious  so  long  as 
they  keep  to  the  north  of  the  sixtieth  parallel,  and 
dismisses  them  as  idle  as  soon  as  they  pass  to  the 
south  of  it  ? Quite  contrary  to  common  sense,  I 
should  say. 

The  only  discredit  which  has  been  thrown  upon 
the  story  of  the  Yinland  voyages,  in  the  eyes  either 
of  scholars  or  of  the  general  public,  has  arisen 
from  the  eager  credulity  with  which  ingenious  an- 
tiquarians have  now  and  then  tried  to  Ab8urd  gpecu- 
prove  more  than  facts  will  warrant.  It 
is  peculiarly  a case  in  which  the  ju- 
dicious  historian  has  had  frequent  occasion  to 
exclaim,  Save  me  from  my  friends  ! The  only 
fit  criticism  upon  the  wonderful  argument  from 
the  Dighton  inscription  is  a reference  to  the 
equally  wonderful  discovery  made  by  Mr.  Pick- 
wick at  Cobham;1  and  when  it  was  attempted, 

1 See  Pickwick  Papers , chap.  xi.  I am  indebted  to  Mr.  Til- 
linghast,  of  Harvard  University  Library,  for  calling  my  attention 
to  a letter  from  Rev.  John  Lathrop,  of  Boston,  to  Hon.  John 
Davis,  August  10,  1809,  containing  George  Washington's  opinion 
of  the  Dighton  inscription.  When  President  Washington  visited 


214  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 
some  sixty  years  ago,  to  prove  that  Governor 

Cambridge  in  the  fall  of  1789,  he  was  shown  about  the  college 
buildings  by  the  president  and  fellows  of  the  university.  While 
in  the  museum  he  was  observed  to  “ fix  his  eye  ” upon  a full-size 
copy  of  the  Dighton  inscription  made  by  the  librarian,  James 
Winthrop.  Dr.  Lathrop,  who  happened  to  be  standing  near 
Washington,  “ ventured  to  give  the  opinion  which  several  learned 
men  had  entertained  with  respect  to  the  origin  of  the  inscription.  ” 
Inasmuch  as  some  of  the  characters  were  thought  to  resemble 
“oriental”  characters,  and  inasmuch  as  the  ancient  Phoenicians 
had  sailed  outside  of  the  Pillars  of  Hercules,  it  was  “ conjec- 
tured ’ ’ that  some  Phoenician  vessels  had  sailed  into  Narragansett 
bay  and  up  the  Taunton  river.  “ While  detained  by  winds,  or 
other  causes  now  unknown,  the  people,  it  has  been  conjectured, 
made  the  inscription,  now  to  be  seen  on  the  face  of  the  rock,  and 
which  we  may  suppose  to  be  a record  of  their  fortunes  or  of  their 
fate.” 

“ After  I had  given  the  above  account,  the  President  smiled 
and  said  he  believed  the  learned  gentlemen  whom  I had  men- 
tioned were  mistaken ; and  added  that  in  the  younger  part  of  his 
life  his  business  called  him  to  be  very  much  in  the  wilderness  of 
Virginia,  which  gave  him  an  opportunity  to  become  acquainted 
with  many  of  the  customs  and  practices  of  the  Indians.  The 
Indians,  he  said,  had  a way  of  writing  and  recording  their  trans- 
actions, either  in  war  or  hunting.  When  they  wished  to  make 
any  such  record,  or  leave  an  account  of  their  exploits  to  any  who 
might  come  after  them,  they  scraped  off  the  outer  bark  of  a 
tree,  and  with  a vegetable  ink,  or  a little  paint  which  they  car- 
ried with  them,  on  the  smooth  surface  they  wrote  in  a way  that 
was  generally  understood  by  the  people  of  their  respective  tribes. 
As  he  had  so  often  examined  the  rude  way  of  writing  practised 
by  the  Indians  of  Virginia,  and  observed  many  of  the  characters 
on  the  inscription  then  before  him  so  nearly  resembled  the  char- 
acters used  by  the  Indians,  he  had  no  doubt  the  inscription  was 
made  long  ago  by  some  natives  of  America.”  Proceedings  of 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society , vol.  x.  p.  115.  This  pleasant  an- 
ecdote shows  in  a new  light  Washington’ s accuracy  of  observa- 
tion and  unfailing  common-sense.  Such  inscriptions  have  been 
found  by  the  thousand,  scattered  over  all  parts  of  the  United 
States ; for  a learned  study  of  them  see  Garrick  Mallery,  “ Pic- 
tographs  of  the  North  American  Indians,”  Reports  of  Bureau  of 
Ethnology , iv.  13-256.  “ The  voluminous  discussion  upon  the 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


215 


Arnold’s  old  stone  windmill  at  Newport1  was  a 
tower  built  by  the  Northmen,  no  wonder  if  the 
exposure  of  this  rather  laughable  notion  should 
have  led  many  people  to  suppose  that  the  story  of 
Leif  and  Thorfinn  had  thereby  been  deprived  of 
some  part  of  its  support.  But  the  story  never 
rested  upon  any  such  evidence,  and  does  not  call 
for  evidence  of  such  sort.  There  is  nothing  in  the 
story  to  indicate  that  the  Northmen  ever  founded 

Dighton  rock  inscription,”  says  Colonel  Mallery,  “ renders  it  im- 
possible wholly  to  neglect  it.  ...  It  is  merely  a type  of  Algon- 
quin rock-carving,  not  so  interesting  as  many  others.  ...  It  is 
of  purely  Indian  origin,  and  is  executed  in  the  peculiar  symbolic 
character  of  the  Kekeewin,”  p.  20.  The  characters  observed 
by  Washington  in  the  Virginia  forests  would  very  probably  have 
been  of  the  same  type.  Judge  Davis,  to  whom  Dr.  Lathrop’s 
letter  was  addressed,  published  in  1809  a paper  maintaining  the 
Indian  origin  of  the  Dighton  inscription. 

A popular  error,  once  started  on  its  career,  is  as  hard  to  kill  as 
a cat.  Otherwise  it  would  be  surprising  to  find,  in  so  meritorious 
a book  as  Oscar  Peschel’s  Geschichte  des  Zeitalters  der  Entdeckun- 
gen , Stuttgart,  1877,  p.  82,  an  unsuspecting  reliance  upon  Rafn’s 
ridiculous  interpretation  of  this  Algonquin  pictograph.  In  an 
American  writer  as  well  equipped  as  Peschel,  this  particular 
kind  of  blunder  would  of  course  be  impossible  ; and  one  is  re- 
minded of  Humboldt’s  remark,  “II  est  des  recherches  qui  ne 
peuvent  s’ex^euter  que  pr6s  des  sources  memes.”  Examen  crit- 
ique, etc.,  tom.  ii.  p.  102. 

In  old  times,  I may  add,  such  vagaries  were  usually  saddled 
upon  the  Phoenicians,  until  since  Rafn’s  time  the  Northmen  have 
taken  their  place  as  the  pack-horses  for  all  sorts  of  antiquarian 
“conjecture.” 

1 See  Palfrey’s  History  of  New  England , vol.  i.  pp.  57-69 ; 
Mason’s  Reminiscences  of  Newport , pp.  392-407.  Laing  ( Heims - 
kringla,  pp.  182-185)  thinks  the  Yankees  must  have  intended  to 
fool  Professor  Rafn  and  the  Royal  Society  of  Antiquaries  at 
Copenhagen ; “ Those  sly  rogues  of  Americans,”  says  he,  “ dearly 
love  a quiet  hoax ; ” and  he  can  almost  hear  them  chuckling  over 
their  joke  in  their  club-room  at  Newport.  I am  afraid  these  Yan- 
kees were  less  rogues  and  more  fools  than  Mr.  Laing  makes  out. 


216 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


forthmen 
founded  a 
colony  in  Vin- 


colony  in  Vinland,  or  built  durable  buildings 
there.  The  distinction  implicitly  drawn 
by  Adam  of  Bremen,  who  narrates 
the  colonization  of  Iceland  and  Green- 
land, and  then  goes  on  to  speak  of 
Vinland,  not  as  colonized,  but  simply 
as  discovered,  is  a distinction  amply  borne  out  by 
our  chronicles.  Nowhere  is  there  the  slightest  hint 
of  a colony  or  settlement  established  in  Yinland. 
On  the  contrary,  our  plain,  business-like  narrative 
tells  us  that  Thorfinn  Karlsefni  tried  to  found  a 
colony  and  failed;  and  it  tells  us  why  he  failed. 
The  Indians  were  too  many  for  him.  The  North- 
men of  the  eleventh  century,  without  firearms, 
were  in  much  less  favourable  condition  for  with- 
standing the  Indians  than  the  Englishmen  of  the 
seventeenth ; and  at  the  former  period  there  existed 
no  cause  for  emigration  from  Norway  and  Iceland 
at  all  comparable  to  the  economic,  political,  and 
religious  circumstances  which,  in  a later  age,  sent 
thousands  of  Englishmen  to  Virginia  and  New 
England.  The  founding  of  colonies  in  America 
in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries  was  no 
pastime ; it  was  a tale  of  drudgery,  starvation,  and 
bloodshed,  that  curdles  one’s  blood  to  read;  more 
attempts  failed  than  succeeded.  Assuredly  Thor- 
finn gave  proof  of  the  good  sense  ascribed  to  him 
when  he  turned  his  back  upon  Yinland.  But  if 
he  or  any  other  Northman  had  ever  succeeded  in 
establishing  a colony  there,  can  anybody  explain 
why  it  should  not  have  stamped  the  fact  of  its 
existence  either  upon  the  soil,  or  upon  history,  or 
both,  as  unmistakably  as  the  colony  of  Green- 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


217 


land?  Archaeological  remains  of  the  Northmen 
abound  in  Greenland,  all  the  way  from  Immarti- 
nek  to  near  Cape  Farewell;  the  existence  of  one 
such  relic  on  the  North  American  continent  has 
never  yet  been  proved.  Not  a single  No  arch*oio- 
vestige  of  the  Northmen’s  presence  here,  SKJnJJS! 
at  all  worthy  of  credence,  has  ever  been  ^dsoutho! 
found.  The  writers  who  have,  from  Btrait 
time  to  time,  mistaken  other  things  for  such  ves- 
tiges, have  been  led  astray  because  they  have  failed 
to  distinguish  between  the  different  conditions  of 
proof  in  Greenland  and  in  Vinland.  As  Mr. 
Laing  forcibly  put  the  case,  nearly  half  a century 
ago,  “Greenland  was  a colony  with  communica- 
tions, trade,  civil  and  ecclesiastical  establishments, 
and  a considerable  population,”  for  more  than  four 
centuries.  “Vinland  was  only  visited  by  flying 
parties  of  woodcutters,  remaining  at  the  utmost 
two  or  three  winters,  but  never  settling  there  per- 
manently. ...  To  expect  here,  as  in  Greenland, 
material  proofs  to  corroborate  the  documentary 
proofs,  is  weakening  the  latter  by  linking  them  to 
a sort  of  evidence  which,  from  the  very  nature  of 
the  case,  — the  temporary  visits  of  a ship’s  crew, 
— cannot  exist  in  Vinland,  and,  as  in  the  case  of 
Greenland,  come  in  to  support  them.”1 

The  most  convincing  proof  that  the  Northmen 
never  founded  a colony  in  America,  south  of 
Davis  strait,  is  furnished  by  the  total  absence  of 
horses,  cattle,  and  other  domestic  animals  from 
the  soil  of  North  America  until  they  were  brought 
hither  by  the  Spanish,  French,  and  English  set- 
1 Laing-,  Heimskringla , vol.  i.  p.  181. 


218  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


tiers  in  the  sixteenth  and  seventeenth  centuries. 

If  the  Northmen  had  ever  settled  in 

If  the  North- 

men  had  V inland,  they  would  have  brought  cat- 

founded  a sue-  •i-i  _ . _ _ . i 

cessfui  colony,  tie  with  them,  and  if  their  colony  had 

they  would  . i t t . 

have  intro-  been  SUCCeSSIul,  it  would  have  intro- 
duced domes-  . _ 

tic  cattle  into  duced  such  cattle  permanently  into  the 

the  North  " 

American  fauna  of  the  country.  Indeed,  our  nar- 
rative  tells  us  that  Karlsefni’s  people 
“had  with  them  all  kinds  of  cattle,  having  the 
intention  to  settle  in  the  land  if  they  could.”1 
Naturally  the  two  things  are  coupled  in  the  nar- 
rator’s mind.  So  the  Portuguese  carried  live- 
stock in  their  earliest  expeditions  to  the  Atlantic 
islands ; 2 Columbus  brought  horses  and  cows,  with 
vines  and  all  kinds  of  grain,  on  his  second  voyage 
to  the  West  Indies;3  when  the  French,  under 
Baron  Lery,  made  a disastrous  attempt  to  found  a 
colony  on  or  about  Cape  Breton  in  1518,  they  left 
behind  them,  upon  Sable  island,  a goodly  stock 
of  cows  and  pigs,  which  throve  and  multiplied 
long  after  their  owners  had  gone ; 4 the  Pilgrims  at 
Plymouth  had  cattle,  goats,  and  swine  as  early  as 
1623.5  In  fact,  it  would  be  difficult  to  imagine  a 

1 “ Their  hofdhu  medh  s&r  allskonar  f&nadh,  thviat  their  setlo- 
dhu  at  byg'g'ja  landit,  ef  their  msetti  that,”  i.  e.,  “ illi  omne  pecu- 
dum  genus  secum  habuerunt,  nam  terram,  si  lieeret,  coloniis 
frequentare  cogitarunt.”  Rafn,  p.  57. 

54  Major,  Prince  Henry  the  Navigator , p.  241. 

3 Irving’s  Life  of  Columbus , New  York,  1828,  vol.  i.  p.  293. 

4 Histoire  chronologique  de  la  Nouvelle  France , pp.  40,  58 ; this 
work,  written  in  1689  by  the  Recollet  friar  Sixte  le  Tac,  has  at 
length  been  published  (Paris,  1888)  with  notes  and  other  original 
documents  by  Eugene  R^veillaud.  See,  also,  Laet,  Novus  Orbis , 
39. 

8 John  Smith,  Generali  Historic , 247. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


219 


community  of  Europeans  subsisting  anywhere  for 
any  length  of  time  without  domestic  animals.  We 
have  seen  that  the  Northmen  took  pains  to  raise 
cattle  in  Greenland,  and  were  quick  to  comment 
upon  the  climate  of  Yinland  as  favourable  for  pas- 
turage. To  suppose  that  these  men  ever  founded 
a colony  in  North  America,  but  did  not  bring  do- 
mestic animals  thither,  would  be  absurd.  But  it 
would  be  scarcely  less  absurd  to  suppose  that  such 
animals,  having  been  once  fairly  introduced  into 
the  fauna  of  North  America,  would  afterward  have 
vanished  without  leaving  a vestige  of  and  roch  ^ 
their  presence.  As  for  the  few  cattle  ITve  c™n?«h£i 
for  which  Thorfinn  could  find  room  in  ti^of  “their 
his  three  or  four  dragon-ships,  we  may  exMeDCe' 
easily  believe  that  his  people  ate  them  up  before 
leaving  the  country,  especially  since  we  are  told 
they  were  threatened  with  famine.  But  that  do- 
mestic cattle,  after  being  supported  on  American 
soil  during  the  length  of  time  involved  in  the  es- 
tablishment of  a successful  colony  (say,  for  fifty  or 
a hundred  years),  should  have  disappeared  without 
leaving  abundant  traces  of  themselves,  is  simply 
incredible.  Horses  and  kine  are  not  dependent 
upon  man  for  their  existence ; when  left  to  them- 
selves, in  almost  any  part  of  the  world,  they  run 
wild  and  flourish  in  what  naturalists  call  a “feral” 
state.  Thus  we  find  feral  horned  cattle  in  the 
Falkland  and  in  the  Ladrone  islands,  as  well  as  in 
the  ancient  Chillingham  Park,  in  Northumber- 
land; we  find  feral  pigs  in  Jamaica;  feral  Euro- 
pean dogs  in  La  Plata ; feral  horses  in  Turkestan, 
and  also  in  Mexico,  descended  from  Spanish 


220 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


horses.1  If  the  Northmen  had  ever  founded  a 
colony  in  Vinland,  how  did  it  happen  that  the 
English  and  French  in  the  seventeenth  century, 
and  from  that  day  to  this,  have  never  set  eyes  upon 
a wild  horse,  or  wild  cattle,  pigs,  or  hounds,  or 
any  such  indication  whatever  of  the  former  pre- 
sence of  civilized  Europeans?  I do  not  recollect 
ever  seeing  this  argument  used  before,  but  it 
seems  to  me  conclusive.  It  raises  against  the  hy- 
pothesis of  a Norse  colonization  in  Vinland  a pre- 
sumption extremely  difficult  if  not  impossible  to 
overcome.2 

1 Darwin,  Animals  and  Plants  under  Domestication , London, 
1868,  vol.  i.  pp.  27,  77,  84. 

2 The  views  of  Professor  Horsford  as  to  the  geographical  situ- 
ation of  Vinland  and  its  supposed  colonization  by  Northmen  are 
set  forth  in  his  four  monographs,  Discovery  of  America  by  North- 
men — address  at  the  unveiling  of  the  statue  of  Leif  EriJcsen,  etc., 
Boston,  1888  ,*  The  Problem  of  the  Northmen , Cambridge,  1889 ; 
The  Discovery  of  the  Ancient  City  of  Norumbega,  Boston,  1890 ; 
The  Defences  of  Norumbega , Boston,  1891.  Among  Professor 
Horsford’s  conclusions  the  two  principal  are:  1.  that  the  “river 
flowing  through  a lake  into  the  sea  ” (Rafn,  p.  147)  is  Charles 
river,  and  that  Leif’s  booths  were  erected  near  the  site  of  the 
present  Cambridge  hospital ; 2.  that  “ Norumbega  ” — a word 
loosely  applied  by  some  early  explorers  to  some  region  or  re- 
gions somewhere  between  the  New  Jersey  coast  and  the  Bay  of 
Fundy  — was  the  Indian  utterance  of  “ Norbega”  or  “ Norway ; ” 
and  that  certain  stone  walls  and  dams  at  and  near  Watertown  are 
vestiges  of  an  ancient  “ city  of  Norumbega,”  which  was  founded 
and  peopled  by  Northmen  and  carried  on  a more  or  less  extensive 
trade  with  Europe  for  more  than  three  centuries. 

With  regard  to  the  first  of  these  conclusions,  it  is  perhaps  as 
likely  that  Leif’s  booths  were  within  the  present  limits  of  Cam- 
bridge as  in  any  of  the  numerous  places  which  different  writers 
have  confidently  assigned  for  them,  all  the  way  from  Point  Judith 
to  Cape  Breton.  A judicious  scholar  will  object  not  so  much  to 
the  conclusion  as  to  the  character  of  the  arguments  by  which  it  is 
reached.  Too  much  weight  is  attached  to  hypothetical  etymolo- 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


221 


As  for  the  colony  in  Greenland,  while  its  popu- 
lation seems  never  to  have  exceeded  5,000  or 
6,000  souls,  it  maintained  its  existence  Furtherfor. 
and  its  intercourse  with  Europe  unin- 
terruptedly  from  its  settlement  in  986,  ony* 
by  Eric  the  Red,  for  more  than  four  hundred 
years.  Early  in  the  fourteenth  century  the  West 
Bygd,  or  western  settlement,  near  Godthaab, 
seems  to  have  contained  ninety  farmsteads  and 
four  churches;  while  the  East  Bygd,  or  eastern 
settlement,  near  Julianeshaab,  contained  one  hun- 
dred and  ninety  farmsteads,  with  one  cathedral 
and  eleven  smaller  churches,  two  villages,  and 
three  or  four  monasteries.1  Between  Tunnudlior- 
bik  and  Igaliko  fiords,  and  about  thirty  miles  from 
the  ruined  stone  houses  of  Brattahlid,  there  now 
stands,  imposing  in  its  decay,  the  simple  but  mas- 
sive structure  of  Kakortok  church,  once  the 
“cathedral  ” church  of  the  Gardar  bishopric,  where 
the  Credo  was  intoned  and  censers  swung,  while 
not  less  than  ten  generations  lived  and  died. 
About  the  beginning  of  the  twelfth  century  there 
was  a movement  at  Rome  for  establishing  new 
dioceses  in  “the  islands  of  the  ocean;  ” in  1106  a 


With  regard  to  the  Norse  colony  alleged  to  have  flourished  for 
three  centuries,  it  is  pertinent  to  ask,  what  became  of  its  cattle 
and  horses  ? Why  do  we  find  no  vestiges  of  the  burial-places  of 
these  Europeans?  or  of  iron  tools  and  weapons  of  mediaeval 
workmanship  ? Why  is  there  no  documentary  mention,  in  Scan- 
dinavia or  elsewhere  in  Europe,  of  this  transatlantic  trade  ? etc., 
etc.  Until  such  points  as  these  are  disposed  of,  any  further  con- 
sideration of  the  hypothesis  may  properly  he  postponed. 

1 Laing,  Heimskringla,  i.  141.  A description  of  the  ruins  may 
be  found  in  two  papers  in  Meddelelser  om  Gronland , Copenhagen, 
1883  and  1889. 


222  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

bishop’s  see  was  erected  in  the  north  of  Iceland, 
and  one  at  about  the  same  time  in  the  Faeroes. 
In  1112,  Eric  Gnupsson,1  having  been  appointed 
by  Pope  Paschal  II.  “bishop  of  Greenland  and 


Ruins  of  the  church  at  Kakortok. 

Yinland  in  partibus  infidelium ,”  went  from  Ice- 
land to  organize  his  new  diocese  in  Greenland. 
It  is  mentioned  in  at  least  six  different  vellums 
Bishop  Eric’s  that  in  1121  Bishop  Eric  “went  in 
searc!f o” vin-  search  of  Yinland.”2  It  is  nowhere 
land,  ii2i.  mentioned  that  he  found  it,  and  Dr. 

Storm  thinks  it  probable  that  he  perished  in  the 
enterprise,  for,  within  the  next  year  or  next  but 
one,  the  Greenlanders  asked  for  a new  bishop, 

1 Sometimes  called  Erie  Uppsi  ; he  is  mentioned  in  the  Land- 
ndma-b<5k  as  a native  of  Iceland. 

2 Storm,  Islandske  Annaler,  Christiania,  1888 ; Reeves,  T'he 
Finding  of  Wineland  the  Good , London,  1890,  pp.  79-81. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


223 


and  Eric’s  successor,  Bishop  Arnold,  was  con- 
secrated in  1124. 1 After  Eric  there  was  a regu- 
lar succession  of  bishops  appointed  by  the  papal 
court,  down  at  least  to  1409,  and  seventeen  of 
these  bishops  are  mentioned  by  name.  We  do 
not  learn  that  any  of  them  ever  repeated  Eric’s 
experiment  of  searching  for  Yinland.  So  far  as 
existing  Icelandic  vellums  know,  there  was  no  voy- 
age to  Yinland  after  1121.  Yery  likely,  however, 
there  may  have  been  occasional  voyages  for  timber 
from  Greenland  to  the  coast  of  the  American  con- 
tinent, which  did  not  attract  attention  or  call  for 
comment  in  Iceland.  This  is  rendered  somewhat 
probable  from  an  entry  in  the  “Elder  Skalholt 
Annals,”  a vellum  written  about  1362.  This  in- 
forms us  that  in  1347  “there  came  a 
ship  from  Greenland,  less  in  size  than  MarkiSdIrom 
small  Icelandic  trading-vessels.  It  was 
without  an  anchor.  There  were  seventeen  men  on 
board,  and  they  had  sailed  to  Markland,  but  had 
afterwards  been  driven  hither  by  storms  at  sea.”2 

1 Storm,  in  Aarbfger  for  NordisJc  Oldkyndighed , 1887,  p.  319. 

2 Reeves,  op.  cit.  p.  83.  In  another  vellum  it  is  mentioned  that 
in  1347  “ a ship  came  from  Greenland,  which  had  sailed  to  Mark- 
land,  and  there  were  eighteen  men  on  hoard.”  As  Mr.  Reeves 
well  observes  : “ The  nature  of  the  information  indicates  that  the 
knowledge  of  the  discovery  had  not  altogether  faded  from  the 
memories  of  the  Icelanders  settled  in  Greenland.  It  seems  fur- 
ther to  lend  a measure  of  plausibility  to  a theory  that  people 
from  the  Greenland  colony  may  from  time  to  time  have  visited 
the  coast  to  the  southwest  of  their  home  for  supplies  of  wood,  or 
for  some  kindred  purpose.  The  visitors  in  this  case  had  evidently 
intended  to  return  directly  from  Markland  to  Greenland,  and 
had  they  not  been  driven  out  of  their  course  to  Iceland,  the  prob- 
ability is  that  this  voyage  would  nevei  have  found  mention  in 
Icelandic  chronicles,  and  all  knowledge  of  it  must  have  vanished 


224 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


This  is  the  latest  mention  of  any  voyage  to  or 
from  the  countries  beyond  Greenland. 

If  the  reader  is  inclined  to  wonder  why  a colony 
could  be  maintained  in  southern  Greenland  more 
easily  than  on  the  coasts  of  Nova  Scotia  or  Massa- 
chusetts, or  even  why  the  Northmen  did  not  at 
once  abandon  their  fiords  at  Brattahlid  and  come 
in  a flock  to  these  pleasanter  places,  he  must  call 
to  mind  two  important  circumstances.  First,  the 
settlers  in  southern  Greenland  did  not  meet  with 
barbarous  natives,  but  only  with  vestiges  of  their 
former  presence.  It  was  not  until  the  twelfth 
century  that,  in  roaming  the  icy  deserts  of  the  far 
north  in  quest  of  seals  and  bearskins,  the  Norse 
hunters  encountered  tribes  of  Eskimo  using  stone 
knives  and  whalebone  arrow-heads;1  and  it  was 
not  until  the  fourteenth  century  that  we  hear  of 
The  Greenland  their  getting  into  a war  with  these 
tacked  by  people.  In  1349  the  West  Bygd  was 
attacked  and  destroyed  by  Eskimos; 
in  1379  they  invaded  the  East  Bygd  and  wrought 
sad  havoc ; and  it  is  generally  believed  that  some 
time  after  1409  they  completed  the  destruction  of 
the  colony. 

Secondly,  the  relative  proximity  of  Greenland 
to  the  mother  country,  Iceland,  made  it  much  eas- 
ier to  sustain  a colony  there  than  in  the  more  dis- 
tant Yinland.  In  colonizing,  as  in  campaigning, 
distance  from  one’s  base  is  sometimes  the  supreme 
circumstance.  This  is  illustrated  by  the  fact  that 

as  completely  as  did  the  colony  to  which  the  Markland  visitors 
belonged.’  ’ 

1 Storm,  Monumenta  historica  Norvegice,  p.  77. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


225 


the  very  existence  of  the  Greenland  colony  itself 
depended  upon  perpetual  and  untrammelled  ex- 
change of  commodities  with  Iceland;  and  when 
once  the  source  of  supply  was  cut  off,  the  colony 
soon  languished.  In  1880  and  1887  the  crowns 
of  Norway  and  Denmark  descended  upon  Queen 
Margaret,  and  soon  she  made  her  precious  contri- 
bution to  the  innumerable  swarm  of  instances  that 
show  with  how  little  wisdom  the  world  is  ruled. 
She  made  the  trade  to  Greenland,  Iceland,  and 
the  Faeroe  isles  “a  royal  monopoly  which  _ 

J J Queen  Margsu* 

could  only  be  carried  on  in  ships  belong-  [yt’®n“ft“opo' 
ing  to,  or  licensed  by,  the  sovereign.  ^c“gfule£‘ 

. . . Under  the  monopoly  of  trade  the 
Icelanders  could  have  no  vessels,  and  no  object  for 
sailing  to  Greenland ; and  the  vessels  fitted  out  by 
government,  or  its  lessees,  would  only  be  ready  to 
leave  Denmark  or  Bergen  for  Iceland  at  the  season 
they  ought  to  have  been  ready  to  leave  Iceland  to 
go  to  Greenland.  The  colony  gradually  fell  into 
oblivion.”1  When  this  prohibitory  management 
was  abandoned  after  1584  by  Christian  III.,  it  was 
altogether  too  late.  Starved  by  the  miserable  pol- 
icy of  governmental  interference  with  freedom  of 
trade,  the  little  Greenland  colony  soon  became  too 
weak  to  sustain  itself  against  the  natives  whose 
hostility  had,  for  half  a century,  been  growing 
more  and  more  dangerous.  Precisely  when  or  how 

1 Laing,  HeimsJcringla , i.  147.  It  has  been  supposed  that  the 
Black  Death,  by  which  all  Europe  was  ravaged  in  the  middle 
part  of  the  fourteenth  century,  may  have  crossed  to  Greenland, 
and  fatally  weakened  the  colony  there ; hut  Yigfusson  says  that 
the  Black  Death  never  touched  Iceland  ( Sturlunga  Saga , vol.  i. 
p.  cxxix.),  so  that  it  is  not  so  likely  to  have  reached  Greenland. 


226 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


it  perished  we  do  not  know.  The  latest  notice  we 
have  of  the  colony  is  of  a marriage  ceremony  per- 
formed (probably  in  the  Kakortok  church),  in 
1409,  by  Endrede  Andreasson,  the  last  bishop.1 
When,  after  three  centuries,  the  great  missionary, 
Hans  Egede,  visited  Greenland,  in  1721,  he  found 
the  ruins  of  farmsteads  and  villages,  the  popula- 
tion of  which  had  vanished. 

Our  account  of  pre-Columbian  voyages  to 
America  would  be  very  incomplete  without  some 
mention  of  the  latest  voyage  said  to  have  been 
made  by  European  vessels  to  the  ancient  settle- 
ment of  the  East  Bygd.  I refer  to  the  famous  nar- 
. , rative  of  the  Zeno  brothers,  which  has 

brothers tian  finished  so  many  subjects  of  conten- 
tion for  geographers  that  a hundred 
years  ago  John  Pinkerton  called  it  “one  of  the 
most  puzzling  in  the  whole  circle  of  literature.”  2 
Nevertheless  a great  deal  has  been  done,  chiefly 
through  the  acute  researches  of  Mr.  Bichard 
Henry  Major  and  Baron  Nordenskjold,  toward 
clearing  up  this  mystery,  so  that  certain  points  in 
the  Zeno  narrative  may  now  be  regarded  as  es- 
tablished ; 3 and  from  these  essential  points  we  may 

1 Laing,  op.  cit.  i.  142. 

2 Yet  this  learned  historian  was  quite  correct  in  his  own  inter- 
pretation of  Zeno’s  story,  for  in  the  same  place  he  says,  “ If  real, 
his  Frisland  is  the  Ferro  islands,  and  his  Zichmni  is  Sinclair.” 
Pinkerton’s  History  of  Scotland , London,  1791,  vol.  i.  p.  261. 

3 Major,  The  Voyages  of  the  Venetian  Brothers , Nicolo  and 
Antonio  Zeno , to  the  Northern  Seas  in  the  XIVth  Century , London, 
1873  (Hakluyt  Society) ; cf.  Nordenskjold,  Om  broderna  Zenos 
resor  och  de  aldsta  kartor  ofner  Norden,  Stockholm,  1883. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  227 

form  an  opinion  as  to  the  character  of  sundry 
questionable  details. 

The  Zeno  family  was  one  of  the  oldest  and  most 
distinguished  in  Venice.  Among  its  members  in 
the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centu-  TheZenofam- 
ries  we  find  a doge,  several  senators  and  lly’ 
members  of  the  Council  of  Ten,  and  military  com- 
manders of  high  repute.  Of  these,  Pietro  Dracone 
Zeno,  about  1350,  was  captain-general  of  the 
Christian  league  for  withstanding  the  Turks ; and 
his  son  Carlo  achieved  such  success  in  the  war 
against  Genoa  that  he  was  called  the  Lion  of  St. 
Mark,  and  his  services  to  Venice  were  compared 
with  those  of  Camillus  to  Rome.  Now  this  Carlo 
had  two  brothers,  — Nicolo,  known  as  “the  Chev- 
alier,” and  Antonio.  After  the  close  of  the  Gen- 
oese war  the  Chevalier  Nicolo  was  seized  with  a 
desire  to  see  the  world,1  and  more  particularly 
England  and  Flanders.  So  about  1390  he  fitted 
up  a ship  at  his  own  expense,  and,  passing  out 
from  the  strait  of  Gibraltar,  sailed  northward 
upon  the  Atlantic.  After  some  days  of  fair 
weather,  he  was  caught  in  a storm  and 

° Nicolo  Zeno 

blown  along  tor  many  days  more,  until  wrecked  upon 
at  length  the  ship  was  cast  ashore  on  Faeroe  islands, 
one  of  the  Faeroe  islands  and  wrecked, 
though  most  of  the  crew  and  goods  were  rescued. 

1 “ Or  M.  Nicolb  il  Caualiere  . . . entrb  in  grandissimo  deside- 
rio  di  ueder  il  mondo,  e peregrinare,  e farsi  capace  di  varij  cos- 
tumi  e di  lingue  de  gli  huomini,  accib  che  con  le  occasioni  poi 
potesse  meglio  far  seruigio  alia  sua  patria  ed  k se  acquistar  fama 
e onore.”  The  narrative  gives  1380  as  the  date  of  the  voyage,  but 
Mr.  Major  has  shown  that  it  must  have  been  a mistake  for  1390 
(op.  cit.  xlii.-xlviii.). 


228 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


According  to  the  barbarous  custom  of  the  Middle 
Ages,  some  of  the  natives  of  the  island  (Scandina- 
vians) came  swarming  about  the  unfortunate  stran- 
gers to  kill  and  rob  them,  but  a great  chieftain, 
with  a force  of  knights  and  men-at-arms,  arrived 
upon  the  spot  in  time  to  prevent  such  an  outrage. 
This  chief  was  Henry  Sinclair  of  Koslyn,  who  in 
1379  had  been  invested  by  King  Hacon  VI. , of 
Norway,  with  the  earldom  of  the  Orkneys  and 
Caithness.  On  learning  Zeno’s  rank  and  impor- 
tance, Sinclair  treated  him  with  much  courtesy,  and 
presently  a friendship  sprang  up  between  the  two. 
Sinclair  was  then  engaged  with  a fleet  of  thirteen 
vessels  in  conquering  and  annexing  to  his  earldom 
the  Faeroe  islands,  and  on  several  occasions  prof- 
ited by  the  military  and  nautical  skill  of  the  Vene- 
tian captain.  Nicolo  seems  to  have  enjoyed  this 
stirring  life,  for  he  presently  sent  to  his  brother 
Antonio  in  Venice  an  account  of  it,  which  induced 
the  latter  to  come  and  join  him  in  the  Faeroe  islands. 
Antonio  arrived  in  the  course  of  1391,  and  remained 
in  the  service  of  Sinclair  fourteen  years,  returning 
to  Venice  in  time  to  die  there  in  1406.  After  An- 
tonio’s arrival,  his  brother  Nicolo  was  appointed 
to  the  chief  command  of  Sinclair’s  little  fleet,  and 
assisted  him  in  taking  possession  of  the  Shetland 
islands,  which  were  properly  comprised  within  his 
earldom.  In  the  course  of  these  adventures, 
Nicolo  seems  to  have  had  his  interest  aroused  in 
reports  about  Greenland.  It  was  not  more  than 
four  or  five  years  since  Queen  Margaret  had  un- 
dertaken to  make  a royal  monopoly  of  the  Green- 
land trade  in  furs  and  whale  oil,  and  this  would 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


229 


be  a natural  topic  of  conversation  in  the  Faeroes. 
In  July,  1393,  or  1394,  Nicolo  Zeno  sailed  to 
Greenland  with  three  ships,  and  visited 

_ A Nicol6’s  voy- 

the  East  Bygd.  Alter  spending  some  age  to  Green- 

land,  cir.  loot. 

time  there,  not  being  accustomed  to  such 
a climate,  he  caught  cold,  and  died  soon  after  his 
return  to  the  Faeroes,  probably  in  1395.  His 
brother  Antonio  succeeded  to  his  office  and  such 
emoluments  as  pertained  to  it ; and  after  a while, 
at  Earl  Sinclair’s  instigation,  he  undertook  a voy- 
age of  discovery  in  the  Atlantic  ocean,  in  order 
to  verify  some  fishermen’s  reports  of  the  existence 
of  land  a thousand  miles  or  more  to  the  west. 
One  of  these  fishermen  was  to  serve  as  guide  to 
the  expedition,  but  unfortunately  he  died  three 
days  before  the  ships  were  ready  to  sail.  Never- 
theless, the  expedition  started,  with  Sinclair  him- 
self on  board,  and  encountered  vicissi- 

Voyage  of  Earl 

tudes  of  weather  and  fortune.  In  fog  Sinclair  and 

^ Antonio  Zeno. 

and  storm  they  lost  all  reckoning  of 
position,  and.  found  themselves  at  length  on  the 
western  coast  of  a country  which,  in  the  Italian 
narrative,  is  called  “Icaria,”  but  which  has  been 
supposed,  with  some  probability,  to  have  been 
Kerry,  in  Ireland.  Here,  as  they  went  ashore  for 
fresh  water,  they  were  attacked  by  the  natives  and 
several  of  their  number  were  slain.  From  this 
point  they  sailed  out  into  the  broad  Atlantic  again, 
and  reached  a place  supposed  to  be  Greenland,  but 
which  is  so  vaguely  described  that  the  identifica- 
tion is  very  difficult.1  Our  narrative  here  ends 

1 It  appears  on  the  Zeno  map  as  “Trin  pmontor,”  about  the 
site  of  Cape  Farewell ; but  how  could  six  days’  sail  W.  from 


230 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


somewhat  confusedly.  We  are  told  that  Sinclair 
remained  in  this  place,  “and  explored  the  whole 
of  the  country  with  great  diligence,  as  well  as  the 
coasts  on  both  sides  of  Greenland.”  Antonio 
Zeno,  on  the  other  hand,  returned  with  part  of 
the  fleet  to  the  Faeroe  islands,  where  he  arrived 
after  sailing  eastward  for  about  a month,  during 
five  and  twenty  days  of  which  he  saw  no  land. 
After  relating  these  things  and  paying  a word  of 
affectionate  tribute  to  the  virtues  of  Earl  Sinclair, 
“a  prince  as  worthy  of  immortal  memory  as  any 
that  ever  lived  for  his  great  bravery  and  remark- 
able goodness,”  Antonio  closes  his  letter  abruptly: 
“But  of  this  I will  say  no  more  in  this  letter,  and 
hope  to  be  with  you  very  shortly,  and  to  satisfy 
your  curiosity  on  other  subjects  by  word  of 
mouth.”1 

The  person  thus  addressed  by  Antonio  was  his 
brother,  the  illustrious  Carlo  Zeno.  Soon  after 
reaching  home,  after  this  long  and  eventful  ab- 
sence, Antonio  died.  Besides  his  letters  he  had 
written  a more  detailed  account  of  the  affairs  in 
the  northern  seas.  These  papers  remained  for 
more  than  a century  in  the  palace  of  the  family  at 
Venice,  until  one  of  the  children,  in  his  mischiev- 
ous play,  got  hold  of  them  and  tore  them  up. 

Kerry,  followed  by  four  days’  sail  N.  E. , reach  any  such  point  ? 
and  how  does  this  short  outward  sail  consist  with  the  return  voy- 
age, twenty  days  E.  and  eight  days  S.  E.,  to  the  Faeroes  ? The 
place  is  also  said  to  have  had  “ a fertile  soil  ” and  “ good  rivers,” 
a description  in  nowise  answering  to  Greenland. 

1 “ Pero  non  ui  diro  altro  in  questa  lettera,  sperando  tosto  di 
essere  con  uoi,  e di  sodisfarui  di  molte  altre  cose  con  la  uiua  uoce.” 
Major,  p.  34. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


231 


This  child  was  Antonio’s  great-great-great-grand- 
son, Nicolo,  born  in  1515.  When  this  young  Ni- 
colo  had  come  to  middle  age,  and  was  a member  of 
the  Council  of  Ten,  he  happened  to  come  across 
some  remnants  of  these  documents,  and  then  all  at 
once  he  remembered  with  grief  how  he  had,  in  his 
boyhood,  pulled  them  to  pieces.1  In  the  light  of 
the  rapid  progress  in  geographical  discovery  since 
1492,  this  story  of  distant  voyages  had  Publication 
now  for  Nicolo  an  interest  such  as  it 


the  remains  of 
the  documents 


could  not  have  had  for  his  immediate  55SS3SS|eP 
ancestors.  Searching  the  palace  he 
found  a few  grimy  old  letters  and  a map  or  sailing 
chart,  rotten  with  age,  which  had  been  made  or  at 
any  rate  brought  home  by  his  ancestor  Antonio. 
Nicolo  drew  a fresh  copy  of  this  map,  and  pieced 
together  the  letters  as  best  he  could,  with  more  or 
less  explanatory  text  of  his  own,  and  the  result 
was  the  little  book  which  he  published  in  1558. 2 

Unfortunately  young  Nicolo,  with  the  laudable 
purpose  of  making  it  all  as  clear  as  he  could, 


1 “ All  these  letters  were  written  by  Messire  Antonio  to  Messire 
Carlo,  his  brother ; and  I am  grieved  that  the  hook  and  many 
other  writings  on  these  subjects  have,  I don’t  know  how,  come 
sadly  to  ruin ; for,  being  but  a child  when  they  fell  into  my 
hands,  I,  not  knowing  what  they  were,  tore  them  in  pieces,  as 
children  will  do,  and  sent  them  all  to  ruin : a circumstance  which 
I cannot  now  recall  without  the  greatest  sorrow.  Nevertheless, 
in  order  that  such  an  important  memorial  should  not  be  lost,  I 
have  put  the  whole  in  order,  as  well  as  I could,  in  the  above  nar- 
rative.” Major,  p.  35. 

2 Nicolb  Zeno,  Bello  scoprimento  delV  i sole  Frislanda , Eslanda, 
Engronelanda , Estotilanda,  8f  Icaria,  fatto  per  due  fratdli  Zeni , 
M.  Nicolo  il  Caualiere,  8?  M.  Antonio.  Libro  Fno,  col  disegno  di 
dette  Isole.  Venice,  1558.  Mr.  Major’s  book  contains  the  entire 
text,  with  an  English  translation. 


232  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


233 


Zeno  Map,  cir.  1400  — eastern  half. 


284  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


thought  it  necessary  not  simply  to  reproduce  the 
old  weather-beaten  map,  but  to  amend  it  by  put- 
ting on  here  and  there  such  places  and  names  as 
his  diligent  perusal  of  the  manuscript  led  him  to 
deem  wanting  to  its  completeness.1  Under  the 
most  favourable  circumstances  that  is  a very  diffi- 
cult sort  of  thing  to  do,  but  in  this  case  the  cir- 
cumstances were  far  from  favourable.  Of  course 
Nicolo  got  these  names  and  places  into  absurd 

1 The  map  is  taken  from  Winsor’s  Narr.  and  Crit.  Hist., i.  127, 
where  it  is  reduced  from  Nordenskjold’s  Studien  ok  Forskningar. 
A better  because  larger  copy  may  be  found  in  Major’s  Voyages 
of  the  Venetian  Brothers.  The  original  map  measures  12  X 15£ 
inches.  In  the  legend  at  the  top  the  date  is  given  as  m ccc  lxxx. 
but  evidently  one  x has  been  omitted,  for  it  should  be  1390,  and 
is  correctly  so  given  by  Marco  Barbaro,  in  his  Genealogie  dei  nohili 
Veneti;  of  Antonio  Zeno  he  says,  “ Scrisse  con  il  fratello  Ni- 
col6  Kav.  li  viaggi  dell’  Isole  sctto  il  polo  artico,  e di  quei  sco- 
primente  del  1390,  e che  per  ordine  di  Zicno,  re  di  Frislanda,  si 
portb  nel  continente  d’  Estotilanda  nell’  America  settentrionale  e 
che  si  fermb  14  anni  in  Frislanda,  ciob  4 con  suo  fratello  Nicolb 
e 10  solo.”  (This  valuable  work  has  never  been  published.  The 
original  MS.,  in  Barbaro’s  own  handwriting,  is  preserved  in  the 
Biblioteca  di  San  Marco  at  Venice.  There  is  a seventeenth  cen- 
tury copy  of  it  among  the  Egerton  MSS.  in  the  British  Mu- 
seum.) — Nicolb  did  not  leave  Italy  until  after  December  14, 
1388  (Muratori,  Rerum  Italicarum  Scriptores , tom.  xxii.  p.  779). 
The  map  can  hardly  have  been  made  before  Antonio’s  voyage, 
about  1400.  The  places  on  the  map  are  wildly  out  of  position,  as 
was  common  enough  in  old  maps.  Greenland  is  attached  to  Nor- 
way according  to  the  general  belief  in  the  Middle  Ages.  In  his 
confusion  between  the  names  “ Estland  ” and  “Islanda,”  young 
Nicolb  has  tried  to  reproduce  the  Shetland  group,  or  something  like 
it,  and  attach  it  to  Iceland.  “ Icaria,”  probably  Kerry,  in  Ireland, 
has  been  made  into  an  island  and  carried  far  out  into  the  Atlantic. 
The  queerest  of  young  Nicolb’s  mistakes  was  in  placing  the  mon- 
astery of  St.  Olaus  (“St.  Thomas”).  He  should  have  placed  it 
on  the  southwest  coast  of  Greenland,  near  his  “ Af  gmontor ; ” 
but  he  has  got  it  on  the  extreme  northeast,  just  about  where 
Greenland  is  joined  to  Europe. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


235 


positions,  thus  perplexing  the  map  and  damaging 
its  reputation.  With  regard  to  names,  there  was 
obscurity  enough,  to  begin  with.  In  the  first 
place,  they  were  Icelandic  names  falling  upon 
the  Italian  ears  of  old  Nicolo  and  Antonio,  and 
spelled  by  them  according  to  their  own 

r i , Queer  trana- 

notions ; in  the  second  place,  these  out-  formations  of 
landish  names,  blurred  and  defaced 
withal  in  the  weather-stained  manuscript,  were  a 
puzzle  to  the  eye  of  young  Nicolo,  who  could  but 
decipher  them  according  to  his  notions.  The  havoc 
that  can  be  wrought  upon  winged  words,  subjected 
to  such  processes,  is  sometimes  marvellous.1  Per- 
haps the  slightest  sufferer,  in  this  case,  was  the 
name  of  the  group  of  islands  upon  one  of  which  the 
shipwrecked  Nicolo  was  rescued  by  Sinclair.  The 

1 “ Combien  de  coquilles  typographiques  ou  de  lecturer  d4fec- 
tueuses  ont  cr£6  de  noms  boiteux,  qu’il  est  ensuite  bien  difficile, 
quelquefois  impossible  de  redresser ! l’histoire  et  la  g^ographie 
en  sont  pleines.”  Avezac,  Martin  Waltzemiiller,  p.  9. 

It  is  interesting  to  see  how  thoroughly  words  can  be  disguised 
by  an  unfamiliar  phonetic  spelling.  I have  seen  people  hope- 
lessly puzzled  by  the  following  bill,  supposed  to  have  been  made 
out  by  an  illiterate  stable-keeper  somewhere  in  England : — 


Osafada 7s  6d 

Takinonimome 4d 

7s  lOd 


Some  years  ago  Professor  Huxley  told  me  of  a letter  from 
France  which  came  to  the  London  post-office  thus  addressed : — 

Sromfr^d^vi, 

Piqu4  du  lait, 

Londres, 

Angleterre. 

This  letter,  after  exciting  at  first  helpless  bewilderment  and 
then  busy  speculation,  was  at  length  delivdted  to  the  right  per- 
son, Sir  Humphry  Davy , in  his  rooms  at  the  Royal  Institution  on 
Albemarle  street,  just  off  from  Piccadilly  ! 


236 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


name  Fceroislander  sounded  to  Italian  ears  as 
Frislanda , and  was  uniformly  so  written.1  Then 
the  pronunciation  of  Shetland  was  helped  by  pre- 
fixing a vowel  sound,  as  is  common  in  Italian,  and 
so  it  came  to  be  Estland  and  Fsland.  This  led 
young  Nicolo’s  eye  in  two  or  three  places  to  con- 
found it  with  Islanda , or  Iceland , and  probably 
in  one  place  with  Irlanda , or  Ireland . Where 
old  Nicolo  meant  to  say  that  the  island  upon  which 
he  was  living  with  Earl  Sinclair  was  somewhat 
larger  than  Shetland,  young  Nicolo  understood 
him  as  saying  that  it  was  somewhat  larger  than 

Ireland ; and  so  upon  the  amended  map 

“Frislanda.”  r . \ 

“hnslanda  appears  as  one  great  island 
surrounded  by  tiny  islands.2  After  the  publica- 
tion of  this  map,  in  1558,  sundry  details  were  cop- 
ied from  it  by  the  new  maps  of  that  day,  so  that 
even  far  down  into  the  seventeenth  century  it  was 
common  to  depict  a big  “Frislanda”  somewhere 
in  mid-ocean.  When  at  length  it  was  proved  that 
no  such  island  exists,  the  reputation  of  the  Zeno 
narrative  was  seriously  damaged.  The  nadir  of 
reaction  against  it  was  reached  when  it  was  de- 
clared to  be  a tissue  of  lies  invented  by  the  younger 
Nicolo,3  apparently  for  the  purpose  of  setting  up 
a Venetian  claim  to  the  discovery  of  America. 


1 Columbus,  on  his  journey  to  Iceland  in  1477,  also  heard  the 
name  Fceroislander  as  Frislanda , and  so  wrote  it  in  the  letter  pre- 
served for  us  in  his  biography  by  his  son  Ferdinand,  hereafter  to 
be  especially  noticed.  See  Major’s  remarks  on  this,  op.  cit.  p.  xix. 

2 Perhaps  in  the  old  worn-out  map  the  archipelago  may  have 
been  blurred  so  as  to  be  mistaken  for  one  island.  This  would  aid 
in  misleading  young  Nicolo. 

8 See  the  elaborate  paper  by  Admiral  Zahrtmann,  in  Nordisk 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


237 


The  narrative,  however,  not  only  sets  up  no  such 
claim,  but  nowhere  betrays  a consciousness  that  its 
incidents  entitle  it  to  make  such  a claim.  ^ narrative 
It  had  evidently  not  occurred  to  young  makefa  claim 
Nicolo  to  institute  any  comparison  be- 
tween  his  ancestors’  voyages  to  Green-  America  ” 
land  and  the  voyages  of  Columbus  to  the  western 
hemisphere,  of  which  we  now  hnou y Greenland  to 
be  a part.  The  knowledge  of  the  North  Amer- 
ican coast,  and  of  the  bearing  of  one  fact  upon 
another  fact  in  relation  to  it,  was  still,  in  1558,  in 
an  extremely  vague  and  rudimentary  condition. 
In  the  mind  of  the  Zeno  brothers,  as  the  map 
shows,  Greenland  was  a European  peninsula ; 
such  was  the  idea  common  among  mediaeval  North- 
men, as  is  nowhere  better  illustrated  than  in  this 
map.  Neither  in  his  references  to  Greenland,  nor 
to  Estotiland  and  Drogio,  presently  to  be  consid- 
ered, does  young  Nicolo  appear  in  "the  light  of  a 
man  urging  or  suggesting  a “claim.”  He  ap- 
pears simply  as  a modest  and  conscientious  editor, 
interested  in  the  deeds  of  his  ancestors  and  im- 
pressed with  the  fact  that  he  has  got  hold  of  im- 
portant documents,  but  intent  only  upon  giving 
his  material  as  correctly  as  possible,  and  refrain- 
ing from  all  sort  of  comment  except  such  as  now 


Tidsshrift  for  OldJcyndighed,  Copenhagen,  1834,  vol.  i.,  and  the 
English  translation  of  it  in  Journal  of  Royal  Geographical 
Society , London,  1836,  vol.  v.  All  that  human  ingenuity  is  ever 
likely  to  devise  against  the  honesty  of  Zeno’s  narrative  is  pre- 
sented in  this  erudite  essay,  which  has  been  so  completely  de- 
molished under  Mr.  Major’s  heavy  strokes  that  there  is  not 
enough  of  it  left  to  pick  up.  As  to  this  part  of  the  question,  we 
may  now  safely  cry,  “ finis,  laus  Deo ! ” 


238  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 

and  then  seems  needful  to  explain  the  text  as  he 
himself  understands  it. 

The  identification  of  “Frislanda”  with  the 
Faeroe  islands  was  put  beyond  doubt  by  the  dis- 
covery that  the  “Zichmni”  of  the  narrative  means 

Henry  Sinclair;  and,  in  order  to  make 

Earl  Sinclair.  . . 7 

this  discovery,  it  was  only  necessary  to 
know  something  about  the  history  of  the  Orkneys ; 
hence  old  Pinkerton,  as  above  remarked,  got  it 
right.  The  name  “Zichmni  ” is,  no  doubt,  a fear- 
ful and  wonderful  bejugglement;  but  Henry  Sin- 
clair is  a personage  well  known  to  history  in  that 
corner  of  the  world,  and  the  deeds  of  “ Zichmni,  ” 
as  recounted  in  the  narrative,  are  neither  more  nor 
less  than  the  deeds  of  Sinclair.  Doubtless  Anto- 
nio spelled  the  name  in  some  queer  way  of  his 
own,  and  then  young  Nicolo,  unable  to  read  his 
ancestor’s  pot-hooks  where  — as  in  the  case  of 
proper  names  — there  was  no  clue  to  guide  him, 
contrived  to  make  it  still  queerer.  Here  we  have 
strong  proof  of  the  genuineness  of  the  narrative. 
If  Nicolo  had  been  concocting  a story  in  which 
Earl  Sinclair  was  made  to  figure,  he  would  have 
obtained  his  knowledge  from  literary  sources,  and 
thus  would  have  got  his  names  right;  the  earl 
might  have  appeared  as  Enrico  de  Santo  Claro, 
but  not  as  “Zichmni.”  It  is  not  at  all  likely, 
however,  that  any  literary  knowledge  of  Sinclair 
and  his  doings  was  obtainable  in  Italy  in  the  six- 
teenth century.  The  Zeno  narrative,  moreover, 
in  its  references  to  Greenland  in  connection  with 
the  Chevalier  Nicolo’s  visit  to  the  East  Bygd, 
shows  a topographical  knowledge  that  was  other- 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


239 


wise  quite  inaccessible  to  the  younger  Nicolo. 
Late  in  the  fourteenth  century  Ivar  Bardsen, 
steward  to  the  Gardar  bishopric,  wrote  a descrip- 
tion of  Greenland,  with  sailing  direc-  Bardsen’a 
tions  for  reaching  it,  which  modem  re-  ofDC-tlon 
search  has  proved  to  have  been  accurate  land  ’’ 
in  every  particular.  Bardsen’ s details  and  those 
of  the  Zeno  narrative  mutually  corroborate  each 
other.  But  Bardsen’ s book  did  not  make  its  way 
down  into  Europe  until  the  very  end  of  the  six- 
teenth century,1  and  then  amid  the  dense  igno- 
rance prevalent  concerning  Greenland  its  details 
were  not  understood  until  actual  exploration  within 
the  last  seventy  years  has  at  length  revealed  their 
meaning.  The  genuineness  of  the  Zeno  narrative 
is  thus  conclusively  proved  by  its  knowledge  of 
Arctic  geography,  such  as  could  have  been  obtained 
only  by  a visit  to  the  far  North  at  a time  before 
the  Greenland  colony  had  finally  lost  touch  with 
its  mother  country. 

The  visit  of  the  Chevalier  Nicolo,  therefore, 
about  1394,  has  a peculiar  interest  as  the  last  dis- 
tinct glimpse  afforded  us  of  the  colony  founded  by 
Eric  the  Red  before  its  melancholy  disappearance 
from  history.  Already  the  West  Bygd  had  ceased 
to  exist.  Five  and  forty  years  before  that  time  it 


1 It  was  translated  into  Dutch  by  the  famous  Arctic  explorer, 
William  Barentz,  whose  voyages  are  so  graphically  described  in 
Motley’s  United  Netherlands , vol.  iii.  pp.  552-576.  An  English 
translation  was  made  for  Henry  Hudson.  A very  old  Danish 
version  may  be  found  in  Rafn’s  Antiquitates  Americanos,  pp.  300- 
318;  Danish,  Latin,  and  English  versions  in  Major’s  Voyages  of 
the  Venetian  Brothers , etc.,  pp.  39-54;  and  an  English  version  in 
De  Costa’s  Sailing  Directions  of  Henry  Hudson , Albany,  1869, 
pp.  61-96. 


240  THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


had  been  laid  waste  and  its  people  massacred  by 
Eskimos,  and  trusty  Xvar  Bardsen,  tardily  sent 
with  a small  force  to  the  rescue,  found  nothing  left 
alive  but  a few  cattle  and  sheep  running  wild.1 
Nicolo  Zeno,  arriving  in  the  East  Bygd,  found 
Themonas-  there  a monastery  dedicated  to  St. 
oiaus  and  its  Olaus,  a name  which  in  the  narrative 
hot  spring.  kas  become  St.  Thomas.  To  this  mon- 
astery came  friars  from  Norway  and  other  coun- 
tries, but  for  the  most  part  from  Iceland.2  It 
stood  “hard  by  a hill  which  vomited  fire  like  Vesu- 
vius and  Etna.”  There  was  also  in  the  neighbour- 
hood a spring  of  hot  water  which  the  ingenious 
friars  conducted  in  pipes  into  their  monastery  and 
church,  thereby  keeping  themselves  comfortable  in 
the  coldest  weather.  This  water,  as  it  came  into 
the  kitchen,  was  hot  enough  to  boil  meats  and  veg- 
etables. The  monks  even  made  use  of  it  in  warm- 
ing covered  gardens  or  hot-beds  in  which  they 
raised  sundry  fruits  and  herbs  that  in  milder  cli- 
mates grow  out  of  doors.3  “Hither  in  summer- 

1 So  he  tells  us  himself : “Quo  cum  venissent,  nullum  homi- 
nem,  neque  christianum  neque  paganum,  invenerunt,  tantummodo 
fera  pecora  et  oves  deprehenderunt,  ex  quibus  quantum  naves 
ferre  poterant  in  has  deportato  domum  redierunt.”  Descriptio 
Grcenlandice,  apud  Major,  p.  53.  The  glacial  men  had  done  their 
work  of  slaughter  and  vanished. 

2 “Mala  maggior  parte  sono  delle  Islande.”  Mr.  Major  is 
clearly  wrong  in  translating  it  “ from  the  Shetland  Isles.”  The 
younger  Nicolo  was  puzzled  by  the  similarity  of  the  names  Xslan- 
da  and  Eslanda,  and  sometimes  confounded  Iceland  with  the  Shet- 
land group.  But  in  this  place  Iceland  is  evidently  meant. 

3 This  application  of  the  hot  water  to  purposes  of  gardening 
reminds  us  of  the  similar  covered  gardens  or  hot-beds  constructed 
by  Albertus  Magnus  in  the  Dominican  monastery  at  Cologne  in 
the  thirteenth  century.  See  Humboldt’s  Kosmos,  ii.  130. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


241 


time  come  many  vessels  from  . . . the  Cape  above 
Norway,  and  from  Trondheim,  and  bring  the 
friars  all  sorts  of  comforts,  taking  in  exchange  fish 
. . . and  skins  of  different  kinds  of  animals. 
. . . There  are  continually  in  the  harbour  a num- 
ber of  vessels  detained  by  the  sea  being  frozen, 
and  waiting  for  the  next  season  to  melt  the  ice.”  1 
This  mention  of  the  volcano  and  the  hot  spring 
is  very  interesting.  In  the  Miocene  period  the 
Atlantic  ridge  was  one  of  the  principal 

, , . . 1 , Volcanoes  of 

seats  ol  volcanic  activity  upon  the  the  north  At- 

...  n . J r ..  lantic  ridge. 

globe;  the  line  or  volcanoes  extended 
all  the  way  from  Greenland  down  into  central 
France.  But  for  several  hundred  thousand  years 
this  activity  has  been  diminishing.  In  France,  in 
the  western  parts  of  Great  Britain  and  the  Heb- 
rides, the  craters  have  long  since  become  extinct. 
In  the  far  North,  however,  volcanic  action  has 
been  slower  in  dying  out.  Iceland,  with  no  less 
than  twenty  active  volcanoes,  is  still  the  most  con- 
siderable centre  of  such  operations  in  Europe. 
The  huge  volcano  on  Jan  Mayen  island,  between 
Greenland  and  Spitzbergen,  is  still  in  action. 
Among  the  submerged  peaks  in  the  northern  seas 
explosions  still  now  and  then  occur,  as  in  1783, 
when  a small  island  was  thrown  up  near  Cape 
Reykianes,  on  the  southern  coast  of  Iceland,  and 
sank  again  after  a year.2  Midway  between  Ice- 
land and  Greenland  there  appears  to  have  stood, 

1 Major,  op.  cit.  p.  16.  The  narrative  goes  on  to  give  a descrip- 
tion of  the  skin-boats  of  the  Eskimo  fishermen. 

2 Daubeny,  Description  of  Active  and  Extinct  Volcanoes , Lon- 
don, 1848,  pp.  307 ; cf.  Judd,  Volcanoes,  London,  1881,  p.  234. 


242 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


in  the  Middle  Ages,  a small  volcanic  island  discov- 
ered by  that  Gunnbjorn  who  first  went  to  Green - 
f ^ land.  It  was  known  as  Gunnbjorn ’s 

bjom’s  Sker-  Skerries,  and  was  described  by  Ivar 

Bardsen.1  This  island  is  no  longer 
above  the  surface,  and  its  fate  is  recorded  upon 
Ruysch’s  map  of  the  world  in  the  1508  edition  of 
Ptolemy:  “Insula  haec  anno  Domini  1456  fuit 
totaliter  combusta,”  — this  island  was  entirely 
burnt  (i.  e.  blown  up  in  an  eruption)  in  1456 ; and 
in  later  maps  Mr.  Major  has  found  the  corrupted 
name  “Gombar  Scheer”  applied  to  the  dangerous 
reefs  and  shoals  left  behind  by  this  explosion.2 
Where  volcanic  action  is  declining  geysers  and 
boiling  springs  are  apt  to  abound,  as  in  Iceland; 
where  it  has  become  extinct  at  a period  geologi- 
cally recent,  as  in  Auvergne  and  the  Rhine  coun- 
try, its  latest  vestiges  are  left  in  the  hundreds  of 
thermal  and  mineral  springs  whither  fashionable 
invalids  congregate  to  drink  or  to  bathe.3  Now 

volcanic  phe  ™ Greenland,  at  the  present  day,  hot 
nomenain  springs  are  found,  of  which  the  most 

Greenland.  r o 7 

noted  are  those  on  the  island  of  Ounar- 
tok,  at  the  entrance  to  the  fiord  of  that  name. 

1 “ Ab  Snefelsneso  Islandiae,  qua  brevissimus  in  Gronlandiam 
trajectus  est,  duorum  dierum  et  duarum  noctium  spatio  navi- 
gandum  est  recto  cursu  versus  oecidentem ; ibique  Gunnbjcernis 
scopulos  invenies,  inter  Gronlandiam  et  Islandiam  medio  situ 
inter jacentes.  Hie  cursus  antiquitus  frequentabatur,  nunc  vero 
glacies  ex  recessu  oceani  euroaquilonari  delata  scopulos  ante 
memoratos  tarn  prope  attigit,  ut  nemo  sine  vitae  discrimine 
antiquum  cursum  tenere  possit,  quemadmodum  infra  dicetur.” 
Descriptio  Grcenlandice,  apud  Major,  op.  cit.  p.  40. 

2 Op.  cit.  p.  lxxvi.  See  below,  vol.  ii.  p.  115,  note  B. 

3 Judd,  op.  cit.  pp.  217-220. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


243 


These  springs  seem  to  be  the  same  that  were  de- 
scribed five  hundred  years  ago  by  Ivar  Bardsen. 
As  to  volcanoes,  it  has  been  generally  assumed 
that  those  of  Greenland  are  all  extinct;  but  in  a 
country  as  yet  so  imperfectly  studied  this  only 
means  that  eruptions  have  not  been  recorded.1 
On  the  whole,  it  seems  to  me  that  the  mention,  in 
our  Venetian  narrative,  of  a boiling  spring  and  an 
active  volcano  in  Greenland  is  an  instance  of  the 
peculiar  sort  — too  strange  to  have  been  invented, 
but  altogether  probable  in  itself  — that  adds  to  the 
credit  of  the  narrative. 

Thus  far,  in  dealing  with  the  places  actually  vis- 
ited by  Nicolo  or  Antonio,  or  by  both  brothers,  we 
have  found  the  story  consistent  and  intelligible. 
But  in  what  relates  to  countries  beyond  Greenland, 
countries  which  were  not  visited  by  either  of  the 
brothers,  but  about  which  Antonio  heard  reports, 
it  is  quite  a different  thing.  We  are  introduced 
to  a jumble  very  unlike  the  clear,  business-like 
account  of  Vinland  voyages  in  the  Hauks-bok. 
Yet  in  this  medley  there  are  some  statements  curi- 
ously suggestive  of  things  in  North  America.  It 
will  be  remembered  that  Antonio’s  voyage  with 
Sinclair  (somewhere  about  1400)  was  undertaken 

1 My  friend,  Professor  Shaler,  tells  me  that  “ a volcano  during’ 
eruption  might  shed  its  ice  mantle  and  afterward  don  it  again  in 
such  a manner  as  to  hide  its  true  character  even  on  a near  view ; ” 
and,  on  the  other  hand,  “ a voyager  not  familiar  with  volcanoes 
might  easily  mistake  the  cloud-bonnet  of  a peak  for  the  smoke 
of  a volcano.”  This,  however,  will  not  account  for  Zeno’s  “hill 
that  vomited  fire,”  for  he  goes  on  to  describe  the  use  which  the 
monks  made  of  the  pumice  and  calcareous  tufa  for  building  pur- 


2.44 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


in  order  to  verify  certain  reports  of  the  existence 
of  land  more  than  a thousand  miles  west  of  the 
Faeroe  islands. 

About  six  and  twenty  years  ago,  said  Antonio 
in  a letter  to  Carlo,  four  small  fishing  craft,  ven- 
turing very  far  out  upon  the  Atlantic,  had  been 
blown  upon  a strange  coast,  where  their  crews 
were  well  received  by  the  people.  The  land 
proved  to  be  an  island  rather  smaller 

Estotiland.  x oii 

than  Iceland  (or  Shetland  ?),  with  a high 
mountain  whence  flowed  four  rivers.  The  inhab- 
itants were  intelligent  people,  possessed  of  all  the 
arts,  but  did  not  understand  the  language  of  these 
Norse  fishermen.1  There  happened,  however,  to 
be  one  European  among  them,  who  had  himself 
been  cast  ashore  in  that  country  and  had  learned 
its  language;  he  could  speak  Latin,  and  found 
some  one  among  the  shipwrecked  men  who  could 
understand  him.  There  was  a populous  city  with 
walls,  and  the  king  had  Latin  books  in  his  library 
which  nobody  could  read.2  All  kinds  of  metals 
abounded,  and  especially  gold.3  The  woods  were 
of  immense  extent.  The  people  traded  with 
Greenland,  importing  thence  pitch  (?),  brimstone, 
and  furs.  They  sowed  grain  and  made  “beer.” 
They  made  small  boats,  but  were  ignorant  of  the 
loadstone  and  the  compass.  For  this  reason,  they 

1 They  were,  therefore,  not  Northmen. 

2 Pruning  this  sentence  of  its  magniloquence,  might  it  perhaps 
mean  that  there  was  a large  palisaded  village,  and  that  the  chief 
had  some  hooks  in  Roman  characters,  a relic  of  some  castaway, 
which  he  kept  as  a fetish  ? 

3 With  all  possible  latitude  of  interpretation,  this  could  not  be 
made  to  apply  to  any  part  of  America  north  of  Mexico. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES.  245 

held  the  newcomers  in  high  estimation.1  The 
name  of  the  country  was  Estotiland. 

There  is  nothing  so  far  in  this  vague  descrip- 
tion to  show  that  Estotiland  was  an  American 
country,  except  its  western  direction  and  perhaps 
its  trading  with  Greenland.  The  points  of  unlike- 
ness are  at  least  as  numerous  as  the  points  of  like- 
ness. But  in  what  follows  there  is  a much 
stronger  suggestion  of  North  America. 

For  some  reason  not  specified  an  expedition  was 
undertaken  by  people  from  Estotiland  to  a country 
to  the  southward  named  Drogio,  and  Dro^Q 
these  Norse  mariners,  or  some  of  them, 
because  they  understood  the  compass,  were  put 
in  charge  of  it.2  But  the  people  of  Drogio  were 
cannibals,  and  the  people  from  Estotiland  on  their 
arrival  were  taken  prisoners  and  devoured,  — all 
save  the  few  Northmen,  who  were  saved  because 
of  their  marvellous  skill  in  catching  fish  with 
nets.  The  barbarians  seemed  to  have  set  much 
store  by  these  white  men,  and  perhaps  to  have  re- 
garded them  as  objects  of  “medicine.”  One  of 
the  fishermen  in  particular  became  so  famous  that 
a neighbouring  tribe  made  war  upon  the  tribe 
which  kept  him,  and  winning  the  victory  took  him 
over  into  its  own  custody.  This  sort  of  thing 
happened  several  times.  Various  tribes  fought  to 
secure  the  person  and  services  of  this  Fisherman, 

1 The  magnetic  needle  had  been  used  by  the  mariners  of  west- 
ern and  northern  Europe  since  the  end  of  the  thirteenth  century. 

2 “ Fanno  nauigli  e nauigano,  ma  non  hanno  la  calamita  ne 
intendeno  col  bossolo  la  tramontana.  Per  ilche  questi  pescatori 
furono  in  gran  pregio,  si  che  il  re  li  spedl  con  dodici  nauigli  uerso 
ostro  nel  paese  che  essi  chiamano  Drogio.”  Major,  op.  cit.  p.  21. 


246 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA . 


so  that  he  was  passed  about  among  more  than 
twenty  chiefs,  and  “wandering  up  and  down  the 
country  without  any  fixed  abode,  ...  he  became 
acquainted  with  all  those  parts.” 

And  now  comes  quite  an  interesting  passage. 
The  Fisherman  “says  that  it  is  a very  great  coun- 
inbabitants  of  try,  and,  as  it  were,  a new  world;  the 
countries  be-16  people  are  very  rude  and  uncultivated, 
yond‘  for  they  all  go  naked,  and  suffer  cruelly 

from  the  cold,  nor  have  they  the  sense  to  clothe 
themselves  with  the  skins  of  the  animals  which 
they  take  in  hunting  [a  gross  exaggeration].  They 
have  no  kind  of  metal.  They  live  by  hunting,  and 
carry  lances  of  wood,  sharpened  at  the  point. 
They  have  bows,  the  strings  of  which  are  made  of 
beasts’  skins.  They  are  very  fierce,  and  have 
deadly  fights  amongst  each  other,  and  eat  one  an- 
other’s flesh.  They  have  chieftains  and  certain 
laws  among  themselves,  but  differing  in  the  differ- 
ent tribes.  The  farther  you  go  southwestwards, 
however,  the  more  refinement  you  meet  with,  be- 
cause the  climate  is  more  temperate,  and  accord- 
ingly there  they  have  cities  and  temples  dedicated 
to  their  idols,  in  which  they  sacrifice  men  and 
afterwards  eat  them.  In  those  parts  they  have 
some  knowledge  and  use  of  gold  and  silver.  Now 
this  Fisherman,  having  dwelt  so  many  years  in 
these  parts,  made  up  his  mind,  if  possible,  to  re- 
turn home  to  his  own  country ; but  his  companions, 
despairing  of  ever  seeing  it  again,  gave  him  God’s 
speed,  and  remained  themselves  where  they  were. 
Accordingly,  he  bade  them  farewell,  and.  made  his 
escape  through  the  woods  in  the  direction  of 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


247 


Drogio,  where  he  was  welcomed  and  very  kindly 
received  by  the  chief  of  the  place,  who  knew  him, 
and  was  a great  enemy  of  the  neighbouring  chief- 
tain; and  so  passing  from  one  chief  to  another, 
being  the  same  with  whom  he  had  been  before, 
after  a long  time  and  with  much  toil,  he  at  length 
reached  Drogio,  where  he  spent  three  years. 
Here,  by  good  luck,  he  heard  from  the  natives  that 
some  boats  had  arrived  off  the  coast;  and  full  of 
hope  of  being  able  to  carry  out  his  intention,  he 
went  down  to  the  seaside,  and  to  his  great  delight 
found  that  they  had  come  from  Estotiland.  He 
forthwith  requested  that  they  would  take  him  with 
them,  which  they  did  very  willingly,  and  as  he 
knew  the  language  of  the  country,  which  none  of 
them  could  speak,  they  employed  him  as  their  in- 
terpreter.” 1 

Whither  the  Fisherman  was  first  carried  in  these 
boats  or  vessels,  Antonio’s  letter  does  not  inform 
us.  We  are  only  told  that  he  engaged  in  some 
prosperous  voyages,  and  at  length  returned  to  the 
Faeroes  after  these  six  and  twenty  years  ^ Fiflher- 
of  strange  adventures.  It  was  appar-  toa“^Lu> 
ently  the  Fisherman’s  description  of  Es-  da'” 
totiland  as  a very  rich  country  ( paese  ricchissimd) 
that  led  Sinclair  to  fit  out  an  expedition  to  visit  it, 
with  Antonio  as  his  chief  captain.  As  we  have 
already  seen,  the  Fisherman  died  just  before  the 
ships  were  ready  to  start,  and  to  whatever  land 
they  succeeded  in  reaching  after  they  sailed  with- 
out him,  the  narrative  leaves  us  with  the  impres- 
sion that  it  was  not  the  mysterious  Estotiland. 

1 Major,  op.  cit.  pp.  20-22. 


248 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


To  attempt  to  identify  that  country  from  the 
description  of  it,  which  reads  like  a parcel  of  ill- 
digested  sailors’  yarns,  would  he  idle.  The  most 
common  conjecture  has  identified  it  with  New- 
foundland, from  its  relations  to  other  points  men- 
tioned in  the  Zeno  narrative,  as  indicated,  with 
fair  probability,  on  the  Zeno  map.  To  identify 
it  with  Newfoundland  is  to  brand  the  description 
as  a “fish  story,”  but  from  such  a conclusion  there 
seems  anyway  to  be  no  escape. 

With  Drogio,  however,  it  is  otherwise.  The 
description  of  Drogio  and  the  vast  country  stretch- 
wastheac-  mg  beyond  it,  which  was  like  a “new 
gio1  wo ven^ into  world,”  is  the  merest  sketch,  but  it 

the  narrative  , , • -i  i , • , • 

by  the  young-  seems  to  contain  enough  characteristic 
er  Nicoi6  ? details  to  stamp  it  as  a description  of 

North  America,  and  of  no  other  country  accessible 
by  an  Atlantic  voyage.  It  is  a sketch  which  ap- 
parently must  have  had  its  ultimate  source  in  some- 
body’s personal  experience  of  aboriginal  North 
America.  Here  we  are  reminded  that  when  the 
younger  Nicolb  published  this  narrative,  in  1558, 
some  dim  knowledge  of  the  North  American  tribes 
was  beginning  to  make  its  way  into  the  minds  of 
people  in  Europe.  The  work  of  Soto  and  Cartier, 
to  say  nothing  of  other  explorers,  had  already  been 
done.  May  we  suppose  that  Nicolb  had  thus  ob- 
tained some  idea  of  North  America,  and  wove  it 
into  his  reproduction  of  his  ancestors’  letters,  for 
the  sake  of  completeness  and  point,  in  somewhat 
the  same  uncritical  mood  as  that  in  which  the  most 
worthy  ancient  historians  did  not  scruple  to  invent 
speeches  to  put  into  the  mouths  of  their  heroes? 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


249 


It  may  have  been  so,  and  in  such  case  the  descrip- 
tion of  Drogio  loses  its  point  for  us  as  a feature 
in  the  pre-Columbian  voyages  to  America.  In 
such  case  we  may  dismiss  it  at  once,  and  pretty 
much  all  the  latter  part  of  the  Zeno  narrative,  re- 
lating to  what  Antonio  heard  and  did,  becomes 
valueless ; though  the  earlier  part,  relating  to  the 
elder  Nicolo,  still  remains  valid  and  trustworthy. 

But  suppose  we  take  the  other  alternative.  As 
in  the  earlier  part  of  the  story  we  feel  sure  that 
young  Nicolo  must  have  reproduced  the  ancestral 
documents  faithfully,  because  it  shows  knowledge 
that  he  could  not  have  got  in  any  other  way;  let  us 
now  suppose  that  in  the  latter  part  also  he  added 
nothing  of  himself,  but  was  simply  a ^ , . 

faithful  editor.  It  will  then  follow  that  present  actual 

experiences  in 

the  Fisherman’s  account  of  Drogio,  re-  Amer* 
duced  to  writing  by  Antonio  Zeno  about 
1400,  must  probably  represent  personal  experiences 
in  North  America ; for  no  such  happy  combination 
of  details  characteristic  only  of  North  America 
is  likely  at  that  date  to  have  been  invented  by  any 
European.  Our  simplest  course  will  be  to  sup- 
pose that  the  Fisherman  really  had  the  experiences 
which  are  narrated,  that  he  was  bandied  about 
from  tribe  to  tribe  in  North  America,  all  the  way, 
perhaps,  from  Nova  Scotia  to  Mexico,  and  yet 
returned  to  the  Faeroe  islands  to  tell  the  tale  ! 
Could  such  a thing  be  possible?  Was  anything 
of  the  sort  ever  done  before  or  since  ? 

Yes:  something  of  the  sort  appears  to  have 
been  done  about  ten  years  after  the  Zeno  narra- 
tive was  published.  In  October,  1568,  that  great 


250 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


sailor,  Sir  J ohn  Hawkins,  by  reason  of  scarcity  of 
food,  was  compelled  to  set  about  a hun- 

The  case  of  A 

David  Ingram,  dred  men  ashore  near  the  Rio  de  Minas, 
on  the  Mexican  coast,  and  leave  them  to 
their  fate.  The  continent  was  a network  of  rude 
paths  or  trails,  as  it  had  doubtless  been  for  ages, 
and  as  central  Africa  is  to-day.  Most  of  these 
Englishmen  probably  perished  in  the  wilderness. 
Some  who  took  southwesterly  trails  found  their 
way  to  the  city  of  Mexico,  where,  as  “vile  Lu- 
theran dogges,”  they  were  treated  with  anything 
but  kindness.  Others  took  northeasterly  trails, 
and  one  of  these  men,  David  Ingram,  made  his 
way  from  Texas  to  Maine,  and  beyond  to  the  St. 
John’s  river,  where  he  was  picked  up  by  a 
friendly  French  ship  and  carried  to  France,  and  so 
got  home  to  England.  The  journey  across  North 
America  took  him  about  eleven  months,  but  one 
of  his  comrades,  Job  Hortop,  had  no  end  of  ad- 
ventures, and  was  more  than  twenty  years  in  get- 
ting back  to  England.  Ingram  told  such  blessed 
yarns  about  houses  of  crystal  and  silver,  and  other 
wonderful  things,  that  many  disbelieved  his  whole 
story,  but  he  was  subjected  to  a searching  exami- 
nation before  Sir  Francis  Walsingham,  and  as  to 
the  main  fact  of  his  journey  through  the  wilder- 
ness there  seems  to  be  no  doubt.1 

1 Ingram’s  narrative  was  first  published  in  Hakluyt’s  folio  of 
1589,  pp.  557-562,  but  in  his  larger  work,  Principal  Navigations , 
etc.,  London,  1600,  it  is  omitted.  As  Purchas  quaintly  says,  “ As 
for  David  Ingram’s  perambulation  to  the  north  parts,  Master 
Hakluyt  in  his  first  edition  published  the  same ; but  it  seemeth 
some  incredibilities  of  his  reports  caused  him  to  leaue  him  out  in 
the  next  impression,  the  reward  of  lying  being  not  to  be  beleeued 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


251 


Far  more  important,  historically,  and  in  many 
ways  more  instructive  than  the  wanderings  of 
David  Ingram,  was  the  journey  of  Cabeza  de 
Yaca  and  his  ingenious  comrades,  in 

0 # # t ’ The  case  of 

1528-36,  from  the  Mississippi  river  cabeza  de 

^ . 1 fl  . Vaca,  1628-36. 

to  their  friends  in  Mexico.  This  re- 
markable journey  will  receive  further  considera- 
tion in  another  place.1  In  the  course  of  it  Cabeza 
de  Yaca  was  for  eight  years  held  captive  by  sundry 
Indian  tribes,  and  at  last  his  escape  involved  ten 
months  of  arduous  travel.  On  one  occasion  he 
and  his  friends  treated  some  sick  Indians,  among 
other  things  breathing  upon  them  and  making  the 
sign  of  the  cross.  As  the  Indians  happened  to  get 
well,  these  Spaniards  at  once  became  objects  of 
reverence,  and  different  tribes  vied  with  one  an- 
other for  access  to  them,  in  order  to  benefit  by 
their  supernatural  gifts.  In  those  early  days,  be- 
fore the  red  men  had  become  used  to  seeing  Euro- 
peans, a white  captive  was  not  so  likely  to  be  put 
to  death  as  to  be  cherished  as  a helper  of  vast  and 

in  truths.”  Purchas  his  Pilgrimes,  London,  1625,  vol.  iv.  p.  1179. 
The  examination  before  Walsingham  had  reference  to  the  pro- 
jected voyage  of  Sir  Humphrey  Gilbert,  which  was  made  in  1583. 
Ingram’s  relation,  “ wch  he  reported  vnto  Sr  Frauncys  Walsing- 
hm,  Knight,  and  diuers  others  of  good  judgment  and  creditt,  in 
August  and  Septemhar,  Ao  Dni,  1582,”  is  in  the  British  Museum, 
Sloane  MS.  No.  1447,  fol.  1-18;  it  was  copied  and  privately 
printed  in  Plowden  Weston’s  Documents  connected  icith  the  History 
of  South  Carolina , London,  1856.  There  is  a MS.  copy  in  the 
Sparks  collection  in  the  Harvard  University  library.  See  the  late 
Mr.  Charles  Deane’s  note  in  his  edition  of  Hakluyt’s  Discourse 
concerning  Westerne  Planting , Cambridge,  1877,  p.  229  ( Collec- 
tions of  Maine  Hist.  Soc.,  2d  series,  vol.  ii.)  ; see,  also,  Winsor, 
Narr.  and  Crit.  Hist.,  iii.  186. 

1 See  below,  vol.  ii.  p.  501. 


252 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


undetermined  value.1  The  Indians  set  so  much 
store  by  Cabeza  de  Vaca  that  he  found  it  hard  to 
tear  himself  away;  but  at  length  he  used  his  in- 
fluence over  them  in  such  wise  as  to  facilitate  his 
moving  in  a direction  by  which  he  ultimately  suc- 
ceeded in  escaping  to  his  friends.  There  seems  to 
be  a real  analogy  between  his  strange  experiences 
and  those  of  the  Fisherman  in  Drogio,  who  became 
an  object  of  reverence  because  he  could  do  things 
that  the  natives  could  not  do,  yet  the  value  of 
which  they  were  able  to  appreciate. 

Now  if  the  younger  Nicolo  had  been  in  the 
mood  for  adorning  his  ancestors’  narrative  by  in- 
serting a few  picturesque  incidents  out  of  his  own 
hearsay  knowledge  of  North  America,  it  does  not 
seem  likely  that  he  would  have  known  enough  to 
hit  so  deftly  upon  one  of  the  peculiarities  of  the 
barbaric  mind.  Here,  again,  we  seem  to  have 
come  upon  one  of  those  incidents,  inherently  prob- 
able, but  too  strange  to  have  been  invented,  that 
tend  to  confirm  the  story.  Without  hazarding 
anything  like  a positive  opinion,  it  seems  to  me 
likely  enough  that  this  voyage  of  Scandinavian 
fishermen  to  the  coast  of  North  America  in  the 
fourteenth  century  may  have  happened. 

It  was  this  and  other  unrecorded  but  possible 
There  may  instances  that  I had  in  mind  at  the  be- 
recordedirh1"  ginning  of  this  chapter,  in  saying  that 
vSitsToNorth  occasional  visits  of  Europeans  to  Amer- 
Amenca.  jea  {n  pre-Columbian  times  may  have 
occurred  oftener  than  we  are  wont  to  suppose.  Ob- 

1 In  the  first  reception  of  the  Spaniards  in  Peru,  we  shall  see 
a similar  idea  at  work,  vol.  ii.  pp.  398,  407. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


253 


serve  that  our  scanty  records  — naturally  somewhat 
perplexed  and  dim,  as  treating  of  remote  and  un- 
known places  — refer  us  to  that  northern  Atlantic 
region  where  the  ocean  is  comparatively  narrow, 
and  to  that  northern  people  who,  from  the  time  of 
their  first  appearance  in  history,  have  been  as 
much  at  home  upon  sea  as  upon  land.  For  a 
thousand  years  past  these  hyperborean  waters  have 
been  furrowed  in  many  directions  by  stout  Scandi- 
navian keels,  and  if,  in  aiming  at  Greenland,  the 
gallant  mariners  may  now  and  then  have  hit  upon 
Labrador  or  Newfoundland,  and  have  made  flying 
visits  to  coasts  still  farther  southward,  there  is 
nothing  in  it  all  which  need  surprise  us.1 


Nothing  can  be  clearer,  however,  from  a survey 
of  the  whole  subject,  than  that  these  pre-Colum- 
bian voyages  were  quite  barren  of  re- 

, p,  r . . ^ T . The  pre-Co- 

suits  of  historic  importance,  in  point  lumbian 

_..  _ _ voyages  made 

oi  colonization  they  produced  the  two  no  real  contri- 

*/  buttons  to  geo- 

ill-fated  settlements  on  the  Greenland  graphical 

. _ _ knowledge ; 

coast,  and  nothing  more.  Otherwise 
they  made  no  real  addition  to  the  stock  of  geo- 
graphical knowledge,  they  wrought  no  effect  what- 
ever upon  the  European  mind  outside  of  Scandi- 


1 The  latest  pre-Columbian  voyage  mentioned  as  having  oc- 
curred in  the  northern  seas  was  that  of  the  Polish  pilot  John 
Szkolny,  who,  in  the  service  of  King  Christian  I.  of  Denmark,  is 
said  to  have  sailed  to  Greenland  in  1476,  and  to  have  touched 
upon  the  coast  of  Labrador.  See  Gomara,  Historia  de  las  Indias, 
Saragossa,  1553,  cap.  xxxvii.  ; Wytfliet,  Descriptionis  Ptolemaicce 
Augmentum,  Douay,  1603,  p.  102 ; Pontanus,  Rerum  Danicarum 
Historia , Amsterdam,  1631,  p.  763.  The  wise  Humboldt  men- 
tions the  report  without  expressing  an  opinion,  Examen  critique , 
tom.  ii.  p.  153. 


254 


THE  DISCOVERY  OF  AMERICA. 


navia,  and  even  in  Iceland  itself  the  mention  of 
coasts  beyond  Greenland  awakened  no  definite 
ideas,  and,  except  for  a brief  season,  excited  no 
interest.  The  Zeno  narrative  indicates  that  the 
Vinland  voyages  had  practically  lapsed  from  mem- 
ory before  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century.1 * * 
Scholars  familiar  with  saga  literature  of  course 
knew  the  story;  it  was  just  at  this  time  that  Jon 
Thordharson  wrote  out  the  version  of  it  which  is 
preserved  in  the  Flateyar-bok.  But  by  the  gen- 
eral public  it  must  have  been  forgotten,  or  else 
the  Fisherman’s  tale  of  Estotiland  and  Drogio 
would  surely  have  awakened  reminiscences  of 
Markland  and  Vinland,  and  some  traces  of  this 
would  have  appeared  in  Antonio’s  narrative  or 
upon  his  map.  The  principal  naval  officer  of  the 
Faeroes,  and  personal  friend  of  the  sovereign,  after 
dwelling  several  years  among  these  Northmen, 
whose  intercourse  with  their  brethren  in  Iceland 
was  frequent,  apparently  knew  nothing  of  Leif  or 
Thorfinn,  or  the  mere  names  of  the  coasts  which 
they  had  visited.  Nothing  had  been  accomplished 
by  those  voyages  which  could  properly  be  called  a 
and  were  in  contribution  to  geographical  knowledge. 
a°DiscoverySof  To  speak  of  them  as  constituting,  in  any 
America.  legitimate  sense  of  the  phrase,  a Dis- 
covery of  America  is  simply  absurd.  Except  for 
Greenland,  which  was  supposed  to  be  a part  of  the 
European  world,  America  remained  as  much  un- 
discovered after  the  eleventh  century  as  before. 

1 Practically,  but  not  entirely,  for  we  have  seen  Markland 

mentioned  in  the  “ Elder  Sk&lholt  Annals,”  about  1362.  See 

above,  p.  223. 


PRE-COLUMBIAN  VOYAGES. 


255 


In  the  midsummer  of  1492  it  needed  to  be  discov- 
ered as  much  as  if  Leif  Ericsson  or  the  whole  race 
of  Northmen  had  never  existed. 

As  these  pre-Columbian  voyages  produced  no 
effect  in  the  eastern  hemisphere,  except  to  leave 
in  Icelandic  literature  a scanty  but  interesting 
record,  so  in  the  western  hemisphere  they  seem  to 
have  produced  no  effect  beyond  cutting  down  a 
few  trees  and  killing  a few  Indians.  In  the  out- 
lying world  of  Greenland  it  is  not  improbable  that 
the  blood  of  the  Eskimos  may  have  received  some 
slight  Scandinavian  infusion.  But  upon  the  abo- 
riginal world  of  the  red  men,  from  Davis  strait  to 
Cape  Horn,  it  is  not  likely  that  any  impression  of 
any  sort  was  ever  made.  It  is  in  the  highest  de- 
gree probable  that  Leif  Ericsson  and  his  friends 
made  a few  voyages  to  what  we  now  Icnov y to  have 
been  the  coast  of  America;  but  it  is  an  abuse  of 
language  to  say  that  they  “discovered”  America. 
In  no  sense  was  any  real  contact  established  be- 
tween the  eastern  and  the  western  halves  of  our 
planet  until  the  great  voyage  of  Columbus  in 
1492. 


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